Virgin Media's Irish boss wants to ramp up original programming at TV3
Tony Hanway also said the company’s purchase of UTV would give it the breadth to do interesting things.
VIRGIN MEDIA IRELAND’S chief executive wants to invest in more Irish-made programming for TV3 and potentially UTV Ireland.
Speaking at the MediaCon summit today in Dublin, Virgin’s Irish boss Tony Hanway said he wants to create a “local feel” across the channels, once the proposed acquisition of UTV is approved in the coming months.
“In Ireland, you have to have a strong swipe of green paint,” Hanway said. “We genuinely want to create employment in Ireland.”
Virgin Media Ireland CEO Tony Hanway
TV3′s most successful original programme, the soap Red Rock, was sold to Amazon Prime in the US last year, while the BBC recently bought the rights to air the second series after a successful first run.
Paraphrasing John Malone, the Irish-American billionaire who owns Virgin Media’s parent company, Liberty Global, Hanway said that television “is very much part of the local community”.
As part of the takeover of UTV Ireland, Virgin would inherit a long-term deal to broadcast ITV productions like Coronation Street and Emmerdale.
Hanway said the purchase of the struggling station “would be a good addition to the portfolio that would give us the channel breadth to do interesting things”.
New investment
Virgin Media Ireland, then called UPC, purchased TV3 for €80 million in 2015. Hanway said it is now time for a “reinvigoration of talent and investment” at the station and that he is ready to “fill out the schedule with compelling stuff”.
Hanway announced at MediaCon that Virgin will sponsor the Irish version of Channel 4′s hit reality TV show Gogglebox, which shows families and friends reacting to television programmes.
He said Virgin pursued the sponsorship deal “very, very gingerly”, but ultimately decided “it’s a perfect match”.
He said there is no plan yet to rebrand the TV3 stable – which includes TV3+1, 3e and the online service, 3player – under the Virgin Media name.
“There’s a lot of equity built up in the TV3 brand,” he said. “We know from moving from the UPC brand that there’s a lot of advantages to moving form one brand to another, but you leave behind a lot of the equity that you’ve built over decades. It’s very final.”
Hanway wouldn’t confirm when former RTÉ2 channel controller Bill Malone will join TV3 as director of programming, but hinted it would be “before the New Year”.
Bill Malone joins TV3 later this year
Broadband
As well as offering television services, Virgin Media provides broadbrand and mobile services, which Hanway said puts the company “at the juncture of the new media paradigm”.
“We want to be across all media,” he said. “That’s why we’ve been buying Wi-Fi assets. That’s why we bought (hotspot provider) Bitbuzz. That’s why we’re looking at public Wi-Fi opportunities in Ireland and the UK. That’s why we have a mobile service.”
Hanway claimed Virgin is going to connect more Irish homes to “superfast broadband” over the next three years.
“Virgin Media is going to become a more overt, integral part of people’s lives. The confluence of media assets and connectivity is the key to that.”
When asked how he rated Ireland’s internet infrastructure, Hanway said the country “is at the back of the queue in terms of connectivity” following the privitisation of Eircom, now Eir, but believes the country is “on the verge of connectivity” with the National Broadband Plan.
