2018 is special for StarTimes as it marks the 30th anniversary of the founding of the company and it is also the 10th year since StarTimes has entered African market in 2008. Now, with nearly 20
million users all across the continent through terrestrial and satellite
television as well as its new online video streaming service, StarTimes is the
leading digital TV operator in Africa.
The followings are Top 10 keywords of StarTimes in the past year:
2018 Russia World Cup
As the official broadcaster of 2018 Russia
World Cup, StarTimes broadcasted all 64 matches in full HD on both DTT and DTH
platforms, which means African football fans enjoyed a clearest World Cup ever.
During World Cup, all of live games, full
highlights, build-ups, interviews, analysis and magazine shows on StarTimes
sports channels will be offered in full HD.
To get people into World Cup atmosphere,
StarTimes forged a series of World Cup special programs, such as World Cup Trekker, World Cup Fiesta and Road to
Russia.
For the commentaries, StarTimes tried to
satisfy diverse demands of audiences. StarTimes offered English, French,
Swahili and Pidgin commentaries to diverse audience groups.
StarTimes ON
In
November 2018, StarTimes launched a new brand, StarTimes ON, for its online
video streaming service, dedicated to providing ultimate entertainment and enriched
experience.
With
the launch of StarTimes ON, the original StarTimes App has been upgraded to
StarTimes ON. StarTimes ON provides Live TV, VOD and short videos with covering
news, sports, movies, series, music, entertainment, documentary, kids and
religion.
Currently, there
are total 150+ channels in over 10 languages
available on StarTimes ON online platform with now
over 140 channels being limited free.
Access to Satellite TV for 10,000 African Villages
Under
the guide of Chinese and African governments, StarTimes rolled out the project
of “Access to Satellite TV for 10,000 African Villages” in 2018, which enabled
thousands of African rural villagers to watch satellite TV.
The project
was first announced by Chinese President Xi Jinping on December 4th, 2015, when
he was delivering a keynote speech at the opening ceremony of the Johannesburg
Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation.
There are
over 10,000 villages in 23 African countries benefiting from the project of
“Access to Satellite TV for 10,000 African Villages”. Under the project, each village is aided with
two StarTimes Projector TVs, one 32 inch Digital TV set and 20 DTH decoders and
satellite dishes. Projector TVs and
Digital TV set will be equipped with solar power systems and DTH access units.
FOCAC Beijing Summit
The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) Summit was successfully
held in Beijing in September with over 3,200 participants from China, Africa
and international organizations having attended the summit, making it the
largest and most high-profile diplomatic event ever hosted by China.
StarTimes, Africa’s leading digital TV operator as well as a Chinese
influential media group, has been a star of China-Africa Cooperation with
playing active roles in African digital migration progress, the project of
Access to Satellite TV for 10,000 African Villages and African HIV/AIDS Prevent
Campaign.
During the summit, StarTimes attracted 18 African presidents and distinguished
guests to visit its Beijing headquarters and all of them expressed their
admiration and support to StarTimes career in Africa.
HIV/AIDS Prevention
In September, First Lady of the Republic of Malawi Gertrude Mutharika, UNAIDS
Executive Director Michel Sidibé and StarTimes Group Vice President Guo Ziqi
held a meeting in Beijint with the theme of “Value of new media in African
HIV/AIDS Prevention Campaign”.
UNAIDS and StarTimes agreed to explore collaboration on increasing
HIV/AIDS awareness among African young people with mobile online video
application as Now new HIV infections and AIDS-related deaths are more likely
to occur among young people in Africa because HIV/AIDS prevention information
and knowledge don’t reach out to young people efficiently.
After the meeting, StarTimes promoted 4 UNAIDS PSAs on the front page of
its online video streaming platform, StarTimes ON in September and December,
which helped deliver the HIV/AIDS Prevention messages to African young people.
SOS Children’s Villages
On May 14th, 2018, StarTimes and SOS Children’s Villages International signed
a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) in Nairobi that the wo organizations
partner towards supporting vulnerable families and children, with an emphasis
on empowering youth in light of the United Nations Sustainable Development
Goals.
The MOU sees StarTimes support SOS Children’s Villages programs in over
ten African countries specifically in broadening local learning opportunities
and extending diverse experiences to young people from SOS Children’s Villages
programmes.
It includes technical and vocational skills training and mentorship,
alongside driving access to digital television in SOS Children’s Villages
programs and benefitting from media exposure on the StarTimes platform.
SOS Children’s Villages would share resources, skills and knowledge as
far as youth employability and capacity building is concerned towards the
implementation of the MOU.
African Digital TV Development Seminar
On June 28th, 2018, the 8th edition of African
Digital TV Development Seminar, organized
by StarTimes, was held in Beijing with a focus on reviewing trends,
developments and cooperation towards digitalizing broadcasting in Africa, as
well as OTT industry which is upgrading African television landscape.
This year’s seminar recorded a landmark with over 400 delegates,
dignitaries, heads of broadcasting corporations and guests from 48 African and
Asian countries attended the event.
Alagbara
In Nigeria, StarTimes in collaboration with veteran Nollywood actor,
Adebayo Salami, popularly known as Oga Bello, completed the production of an
exclusive TV series titled ‘Alagbara’.
The production of was commissioned by StarTimes early 2018, making it
the first fully commissioned series by StarTimes and one of the best production
ever done in the Yoruba movie industry.
According to Oga Bello: “Producing this series for StarTimes was a
deliberate decision because of the positive impact that StarTimes has had on
the African continent especially with its contribution to local content across
Africa.”
UPL
In 2018, StarTimes unveiled the biggest ever single
sponsorship in the history of Ugandan sport after remarkably securing the
Uganda Premier League and FUFA Big League "Title
and Broadcasting Rights" from FUFA for a staggering US$
7,240,000 for 10 years starting with the 2018/2019 season.
The FUFA President Moses Magogo was full of praise for
StarTimes and thanked them for the endorsement this gesture has given to FUFA’s
leadership: “The enabling environment
that FUFA has created by improving the image of local football and setting in
place visible systems and structures to improve the game is now paying off.
Sponsors are strategic stakeholders in football and it’s incumbent upon the
football fraternity, leaders, players and everyone to support StarTimes who
have selflessly demonstrated their goodwill to see Ugandan football progress
with this historic sponsorship.”
The Vice President of StarTimes Uganda company, Aldrine
Nsubuga said: “The legacy we want
to leave behind in the Ugandan local communities is the support towards the
development of football -the
game that unites the whole country without bias. A strong top division league reflects on the strength of
our national team the Cranes.”
30th Anniversary
18th October, 2018 marks the 30th anniversary of the
founding of StarTimes. President of StarTimes Group, Pang Xinxing led a running
for the 30th anniversary and gave a stirring speech for the celebration at
StarTimes Beijing Headquarters on the day, stressing the “We never give up”
spirit of the company.
The StarTimes President said in his peech: “In the
past 30 years, the setbacks that we have had experienced, the difficulties we
have had overcome, and the crises that had been resolved cannot be expressed by
numbers. But no matter what, we always stay true to our mission and never give
up. In the spirit of persistence, we are unswervingly moving toward our
established goals.”
He stressed that no
matter how the market changes, no matter how perilous the situation is, our
vision of “enabling every African family to afford digital TV, watch digital
and enjoy digital TV” remains unchanged.
