News Broadcasting
SBS Broadcasting sees success with first original drama series
CANNES: Capitalising on its successful productions of local formats, SBS Broadcasting has branched out into original scripted drama development. The pan-European broadcaster’s first original dramatic series For Better or Worse runs Monday through Friday 7 pm time slot on host network TV2 Hungary.
Today, more than a year since its debut, For Better or Worse continues to average 1.35 million viewers for a 14.4 rating/28 share among total viewers nationwide, the company claims in an official release.
Initially conceived in November 2004 by Interaktiv, the SBS-owned production company, For Better or Worse (Joban Rosszban in Hungarian) is a hospital drama series set in the small town of Csillagkut, near the capital city of Budapest. The hospital, Csillagvirag Clinic, is privately owned by Peter Pongracz (the series’ protagonist) and his sister Reka, both practicing doctors. Focusing on the everyday lives of the town’s three most influential families – the Pongracz, Nemes and Varnagy families – the series explores human relationships as well as medical issues.
The multi-layered storylines, crafted by the writing team of the scripted division of Interaktiv, involve elements of romance, jealousy, adolescence, comedy, and drama.
TV2 head of programming Lóránd Poich says: “We are very pleased with the audiences’ response to For Better or Worse. Airing the program as a half-hour daily strip for over a year, we are encouraged by its ability to deliver consistently across all target demographic groups, proving to us that locally produced programming resonates with the viewer and really does provide an advantage to our station.”
Added SBS Broadcasting VP production Daniela Matei, “This series has been an interesting exploration of developing original scripted drama series for our stations. As you know, our corporate mandate is always to deliver the best programming possible in the most cost effective and efficient manner. And based on the continuing success of this series and the affordability of the production, we are now looking at the possibility of adapting the local Hungarian scripts for other markets.”
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.
