
Eurodata TV Worldwide announces new monitoring of television programmes in Sub-Saharan Africa
NoTa, the monitoring service for new TV and Web programmes around the world, is extending its offering to Sub-Saharan Africa, with three new African countries: the Ivory Coast, Kenya and Nigeria. According to Sahar Baghery, the director of TV Formats Division at Eurodata TV Worldwide, ‘It is a major step towards the monitoring of TV programmes in Sub-Saharan Africa in a context which is seeing an increase in the number screens, the advent of digital, new stakeholders and creative dynamism.’
This new NoTa service detects new programmes on 14 channels.
Economic growth in Africa in recent years has favoured a large increase in the quantity of TV equipment and audience numbers. The move to digital television, scheduled for the end of 2015, will allow 100 million African households to access many digital channels, something which represents an opportunity for the development and professionalisation of the audio-visual industry.
Traditionally dominated by two main stakeholders, the South African MultiChoice for English-speaking Africa and Canal+ Overseas for French-speaking Africa, the market is seeing the emergence of new players, such as the Chinese StarTimes, as well as some local joint ventures.
Furthermore, some large audiovisual groups, such as Canal Plus and Lagardère are investing increasingly in the creation of African channels and content. The launch of the A+ channel by the Canal Plus group in October 2014 is a strong sign of this market’s dynamism and potential. There are also several initiatives in the news field. Euronews will soon be launching a pan-African news channel from Congo, ‘Africanews’. Another example is the Nigerian channel ‘Arise News’, currently broadcasting from London, New York, Johannesburg and Lagos.
Creative emulation is also stimulating the online video market with the appearance of many VOD and SVOD platforms, such as AfroStream, which has close ties with the TF1 group.In this context and as an illustration, one of the trends observed with NoTa is the launch of many new local reality-based television shows.
For example, in Nigeria, the reality TV show My Big Nigerian Wedding broadcast on Africa Magic Showcase offers couples the chance to win a wedding and a dream honeymoon. Inspired by the American programme Next Top Model, the Ivory Coast reality show Nouvelle Top sees fifteen young African girls living together in a house compete to become the best model. Finally, in Kenya, the adaptation of the programme America’s Got Talent will be coming to KTN this summer.
These three new countries in Sub-Saharan Africa are completing the NoTa service which, in Africa, has already included Egypt since January 2012 and South Africa since June 2013. Remember that NoTa is designed for TV programme producers, distributors and broadcasters. This service allows them to identify promising new concepts and markets and optimise programme acquisition.
In total, every day NoTa analyses TV and Web trends in more than 44 territories around the world, namely more than 450 channels and 11500 programmes. For each programme, NoTa provides key information which includes a description, a video extract, audience numbers or audience forecasts, its distributors, the number of countries in which it is broadcast, competing or similar programmes.