As digital arm churns out profits, CNBC explores reality TV

Nearly two decades since making its first broadcast from Hong Kong, the Asia-Pacific operation of CNBC has developed into the leading satellite and cable business news network across the region. 

“We’ve made tremendous progress. We’re now No1 in terms of ratings – whether you measure it by day, week, month or quarter – by a healthy distance,” Mark Hoffman, the chief executive and president of parent CNBC in the United States, told the South China Morning Post. 

CNBC’s Asia-Pacific operation was set up in the city in June 1995 as part of the American cable and satellite business news television channel’s 24-hour financial market coverage around the world. The following year, it became the first US-owned, Asia-based television  news organisation to open a bureau in Shanghai. 

The network, which moved its regional headquarters to Singapore in 1998, has managed to make some headway into the mainland’s highly restrictive media market. The country’s vast media market continues to be technically off-limits to foreign investors.

In 2003, CNBC formed a strategic partnership with the Shanghai Media Group, one of the mainland’s biggest entertainment and media conglomerates, which provides business news from the country’s financial centre to the network.

Another important collaboration was made in 2010 with state broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV). Hoffman  said the CCTV deal has allowed CNBC to gain access to “roughly 400 million homes inside the mainland”. 

CNBC opened a new bureau in Beijing in 2012. Other programmes originate from Sydney,  and bureaus are maintained in Tokyo and Seoul. CNBC also has a joint venture, TV18 Broadcast, in India with Network18 Media and Investments.