Network Ten and Sky News sign multi-year content deal in win for regions
Sky News Australia and Network Ten have signed a new multi-year deal to broadcast Sky News Regional across the eastern states, following Ten’s acquisition of non-metro TV licences.
Sky News Australia and Network Ten have signed a new, multi-year deal to broadcast Sky News Regional across the eastern states, following Ten’s acquisition of a slew of non-metro television licences over the past seven months.
Ten bought Southern Cross Austereo’s TV licences in Queensland, southern NSW and Victoria in December last year, and also acquired the WIN Network’s northern NSW and Gold Coast licences two months ago, rounding out the network’s distribution into the key regional markets.
The value of the agreement between Sky News and Network Ten has not been disclosed, nor has the length of the contract.
Network Ten’s president and the head of streaming and regional lead of Paramount Australia, Beverley McGarvey, said the deal with Sky had been in keeping with the network’s strategy to increase its investment in regional Australia.
“This deal also leverages the expertise of our unified national sales team, broadens our advertising inventory and national market offering, giving our clients and partners unparalleled access to key regional audiences. We’ve achieved another significant milestone of Network Ten’s commercial strategy, which is aligned to our acquisition of major regional TV licences,” she said.
Sky News Regional began as Sky News on WIN in September 2018. Three years later, it rebranded as Sky News Regional, and has since delivered strong year-on-year ratings growth with average audiences up 23 per cent over the past 12 months.
More than three million unique regional viewers watched free-to-air Sky News Regional in 2024.
Sky News Australia is owned by News Corp, publisher of The Australian.
Paul Whittaker, chief executive of Sky News Australia, said: “Sky News Regional was established to deliver an essential news service for regional Australians and since launching has consistently grown its audience, with more people than ever now relying on our live news coverage and opinion programming that speaks to the issues they care about.
“Through this multi-year agreement with Network Ten, we’re pleased to provide our loyal regional free-to-air viewers ongoing access to our unrivalled mix of live breaking news, insightful opinion, documentaries, sport, business and weather updates.”
Sky News Regional is shown for free on Channel 56 in regional Victoria, southern NSW and Queensland, and Channel 53 in northern NSW and the Gold Coast. It airs 24 hours a day, seven days a week and incorporates live news, business, sport and weather content from Sky News Australia and Fox Sports.
It also carries Sky News’s opinion and analysis-led prime time programs, including shows hosted by Chris Kenny, Peta Credlin, Andrew Bolt, Sharri Markson and Paul Murray.
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