News Broadcasting
Nimbus to launch 3 sports channels, raises $ 30 million
MUMBAI: Harish Thawani’s Nimbus Communications Limited today announced that it would be launching three sports channels between October 2006 and September 2007.
Nimbus also announced that it has raised Rs 1.35 billion ($ 30 million) fresh capital from Deutsche Bank with the option of seeking another $ 30 million. SAE Euromax Capital Ltd, the London based boutique investment bank acted as the transaction adviser to Nimbus.
The first, a cricket centric sports channel, will commence broadcasting from October 2006. The second channel will focus on sports entertainment, not restricting itself to merely sports events but also broadcasting sports themed entertainment programmes, is scheduled to commence broadcasting from April 2007. The third channel will be a sports news service and will launch September 2007.
It was last August that UK-based private equity and venture fund 3i acquired around 33 per cent stake in Nimbus for $45.50 million (approx Rs 1.97 billion).
The new capital raised is being largely invested by Nimbus in its sports broadcasting business. Nimbus believes that the introduction in India in 2006 of three new DTH platforms in addition to the existing DishTV (not counting Doordarshan’s free service) will provide a major new thrust to cricket channels. The reasoning being that in addition to revenues from cable, multiple DTH platforms would drive subscription revenues.
Nimbus plans to provide separate feeds to DTH (HDTV, interactive, multiple languages), cable (SDTV customised, English/Hindi) and DD (basic feed).
News Broadcasting
News TV viewership jumps 33 per cent as West Asia war draws audiences
BARC Week 8 data shows news share rising to 8 per cent despite T20 World Cup
NEW DELHI:Â Even as individual television news channel ratings remain under a temporary pause, the genre itself is seeing a clear surge in audience attention.
According to the latest data from Broadcast Audience Research Council India, television news recorded a 33 per cent jump in genre share in Week 8 of 2026, covering February 28 to March 6.
The news genre accounted for 8 per cent of total television viewership during the week, up from 6 per cent the previous week. The spike in attention coincided with escalating geopolitical tensions involving the United States, Israel and Iran, which have kept global headlines firmly fixed on West Asia.
The rise is notable because it came at a time when cricket was dominating television screens. The high-stakes stages of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup, including the Super 8 fixtures and semi-finals, were being broadcast during the same period.
Despite the cricket frenzy, viewers appeared to be toggling between sport and global affairs, boosting the overall share of news programming.
The surge in genre share comes even as the government has enforced a one-month pause on publishing ratings for individual news channels. The move followed regulatory scrutiny of the television ratings ecosystem.
While channel-level rankings remain temporarily out of sight, the genre-level data suggests that when global tensions escalate, audiences continue to turn to television news for real-time updates.
