MUMBAI: With a lot of live sports content at its disposal, Star India is gearing up to launch a new sports channel under the Star Sports brand on 11 March.

Christened Star Sports 2, the channel will have international football as its driver content. It will also show other sports content.

Star has the broadcast rights to football properties like English Premier League, Spanish league La Liga and Italian league Serie A for India besides FA Cup rights.

"Yes, we are launching a new sports channel on 11 March. Star Sports 2 will primarily have international football content besides other sports content," Star India COO Sanjay Gupta tells Indiantelevision.com.

The channel will be initially available on digital cable networks and will be subsequently rolled out on analog cable networks across the country.

Star is launching the new channel to avoid overlapping of cricket content with other sports content. The problem only accentuates when India cricket is on as the broadcaster has a bi-lingual feed in English and Hindi on Star Sports and Star Cricket.

It will also help the broadcaster to streamline the scheduling of its different properties.

"We have a lot of sports content, so at times we are unable to utilise this content when there are multiple events lined up simultaneously," Gupta explains.

The broadcaster has dedicated supply of cricket content throughout the year as it holds the media rights for three cricket boards, India, Australia and England, in addition to the ICC rights. Besides cricket and football, Star also boasts of rights to properties like Formula One, MotoGP, Wimbledon, Australian Open in Tennis, and PGA Tour.

News Corps, which had last year acquired ESPN?s stake in joint venture ESPN Star Sports (ESS) for $335 million, had restructured its sports broadcasting business in Asia. While the India business was brought under Star India, the rest of Asia business came under Fox Star Sports Asia under Peter Hutton.

Subsequently, the ESPN brand name was dropped across Asia except India where Star is awaiting government clearance on the ESS acquisition before taking a call on change of brand name.

"We have still not decided what we will do with ESPN. We are considering both Fox as well as Star brand name. However, a final call is yet to be taken," Gupta discloses.

NEW DELHI: Sports broadcaster ESPN Star Sports will cover the Australian Open 2013 in High Definition on ESPN HD in addition to the Standard Definition feed on Star Sports.

The coverage will include up to 140 hours of live high definition broadcast of the Australian Open, which begins 14 January.

Both channels? all-inclusive television coverage of the 2013 Australian Open includes nearly 140 hours of live tennis matches as well as exclusive studio presentation and analysis by top presenter Alan Wilkins and popular tennis expert Vijay Amritraj.

In addition, Paula Malai Ali will be in Melbourne bringing colour stories from the tournament, and one-on-one interviews with top players.

MUMBAI: ESPN Star Sports, Asia?s leading sports broadcaster, has unveiled a brand new presentation for the upcoming India England cricket series in Hindi on its cricket specific channel Star Cricket.

Star Cricket?s presentation/ production will be based on the theme ? ?Jo baat hindi mein hai, kissi aur mein nahi.... Dekhiye India vs. England 15 Nov se Hindi mein sirf Star Cricket par?.

Star India COO Sanjay Gupta commented, "This is the need of the hour. 85% of the core cricket viewers prefer to watch Hindi content on TV. By providing world class Hindi presentation and commentary we believe this will significantly increase the involvement with the game and have a positive impact on viewership.?

While Star Cricket will telecast the Hindi presentation, Star Sports and Star Cricket HD will have the English version.

Speaking on the occasion, ESPN Software India MD Aloke Malik said, ?We already have lined up an impressive array of cricket experts who we feel will provide a sharp, incisive and engaging view of the game. Viewers who are keen to watch the action with English commentary can catch the action on Star Sports or Star Cricket HD."

To build up its new offering, the sports broadcaster has lined up experts who will do commentary as well as studio analysis on every match day. The list includes former cricketers like Kapil Dev, Ramiz Raja, Navjot Singh Sidhu, Saurav Ganguly, Arun Lal besides noted cricket journalist Ayaz Memon amongst others.

The India England series, which is currently underway, involves four Test matches, two T20 matches and five ODIs.

MUMBAI: Sony Six, Multi Screen Media?s sports channel, has inked a three-year deal with National Basketball Association (NBA) to become the sole broadcast partner of the American professional basketball league in India.

The broadcast rights were earlier shared between Sony Pix, the English movie channel from MSM, and Zeel-owned sports broadcaster Ten Sports.

Sony Six, which has Indian Premier League (IPL) and Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) as its tent pole properties, has identified NBA to attract young audiences towards the sports and entertainment channel.

The sportscaster sees a fit with the property and feels it can develop it in India through aggressive marketing which includes drawing on Bollywood?s popularity to attract new audiences.

"Our study shows that the youth want new sports which are fast paced in nature and Basketball is a fast paced sport. We see huge opportunity to build NBA in India and have big plans to promote it," MSM CEO Man Jit Singh tells Indiantelevision.

The comprehensive partnership with Sony Six will include live NBA games, original programming, and a joint commitment to host grassroots basketball events on the ground.

The two partners will create customised local programming and will focus on engaging Indian youth by bringing together talent from the NBA, Sony Entertainment and Bollywood.
Before Ten Sports and Sony Pix, ESPN Star Sports (ESS) was the long standing broadcast partner for NBA in India but decided not to renew its partnership due to poor viewership. Singh, however, is unfazed.

"NBA was never promoted properly in India. Our plan is to work in tandem with NBA to promote the sport by bringing in NBA players, through college festivals, and 3x3 Basketball that will have NBA players pitted against basketball fans," he added.

Singh feels NBA is a viable sport for the broadcaster in the long run but in the short-term it will invest in the sport. "It is definitely a viable property but we are looking at it from an investment point of view," he asserted.

He did not see any issue with the timing of NBA games which are generally aired early in the morning, "Every sport fan wants to watch a game live. However for those who can?t watch NBA games early in the morning we have repeats in the prime time," he reasoned.

Apart from IPL, UFC and NBA, Six has also identified racquet sports and football to build the channel even as it continues to evaluate cricket boards that are coming up for renewal. MSM has also placed bids for English Premier League rights which are currently held by ESS.

The broadcaster had unsuccessfully bid for England Cricket Board and West Indies Cricket Board rights which were eventually retained by incumbent broadcasters, ESPN Star Sports and Taj Television respectively.

Most of the cricket rights are locked in excluding Sri Lanka Cricket Board, Pakistan Cricket Board, Bangladesh Cricket Board and New Zealand Cricket.

"We will certainly bid for properties as and when they come up. Having said that, we are not going bid crazy amounts," Singh averred.

NBA India Senior Director Business Development & Partnerships said the reason the league decided to partner Sony Six was because of its overall package they offered which includes favourable time slot and other on-air and on-ground initiatives that are critical engaging fans.

"We spoke to different broadcasters but Sony Six was the one who presented the most comprehensive partnership. They were willing to partner not just on the air but on the ground as well," Jain said.

"They are giving us a favourable timeslot on air. Besides matches, they will air magazine shows and highlights. They will also have local content by showcasing the basketball scene in India. They will also have instructional content for coaches and players."

Sony Six will air live NBA games each week on Thursday, Friday and Sunday with replays in prime-time. The Sunday game will be the "Game of the Week" featuring the NBA game airing at noon or 1:00 pm ET in the U.S.

In total, fans in India will have access to 72 NBA regular season games, up to 18 NBA Playoff games, the Eastern and Western Conference Finals, the NBA Finals and NBA All-Star events including the All-Star Game, All-Star Saturday Night, and the Rising Stars competition.

The NBA and Sony Six will also create a weekly NBA lifestyle program and a series of instructional vignettes that will help educate fans on the rules of the game and basketball terminology.

Apart from metros, NBA will also work with Sony Six to viewership in second and third tier cities.

"The aim is to showcase the NBA experience and lifestyle. We will package elements from this and create a platform. We will be doing marketing activities to create awareness about the partnership which includes social media, promos, and contests. Fans will get the chance to go to the US. They will get opportunity to attend games and get Behind The Scenes VIP Access to meet players," Jain added.