Prime (New Zealand TV channel)

Prime logo used from 2013 until 2016

During early 1998, the United Christian Broadcasters purchased 34 TV licences of UHF spectrum from TVNZ that had been used for the defunct Horizon Pacific and MTV channels.

Then during June 1998, Prime Television Limited in Australia purchased the unused 34 TV licences from United Christian Broadcasters for approximately A$3.6 million. The licences covered all major cities and towns, mainly on UHF, except for the Gisborne area, which is served via a VHF signal. On 30 August 1998, Prime Television New Zealand began broadcasting at 6.30 pm with Two Fat Ladies.

Originally the station broadcast classic British programming, documentaries, sports and dramas aimed at the 30 years and above age bracket. In Waikato and Christchurch, Prime produced a half-hour nightly news programme. Although these programmes rated well, they were unprofitable.

In February 2002, Prime New Zealand entered into an agreement with Australian media mogul Kerry Packer's PBL (parent of the Nine Network). Under this five-year agreement, Nine agreed to provide the station with content it owned the rights to, expertise and an amount of cash. In return, Nine was given the right to acquire 54% of Prime New Zealand at the end of the contract. If Prime New Zealand continued to lose money, Nine could choose not to take this up.

After this deal, Prime took on a broader and more expensive programming mix and axed the local content to cut costs. This increased ratings and profits significantly. This new format was modelled closely on the Global Television Network in Canada, whose parent company Canwest happened to own TV3 at the time.

Almost immediately, some Australian programmes produced by Nine Network and shown on Prime NZ took on a slightly New Zealand flavour. For example, one New Zealander per week began to appear on the Australian version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, and weather details for New Zealand cities appeared on the Australian Today breakfast programme. Localisation of Australian programmes increased, with New Zealander Charlotte Dawson becoming the presenter of a New Zealand version of Nine travel programme Getaway (Dawson left this position at the end of 2006). Many Australian programmes were simply broadcast on Prime without any adaptation for New Zealand audiences, however.

During 2003–04, the number of Australian programmes broadcast decreased. These were largely replaced with more expensive (and higher rated) British and American programmes, such as a Sunday evening British drama slot.

On 2 November 2004, TVNZ presenter Paul Holmes announced that he was resigning from his Holmes programme on the state broadcaster and beginning a new one on Prime in 2005. This new programme, called Paul Holmes, began on 7 February 2005. The arrival of Holmes was seen as a major sign of Prime's rise in status, from a small, second-tier network to a major player on the New Zealand scene, joining TVNZ and TV3 in this regard. The programme, however, did not rate well. In June 2005, Prime moved the show to 6 pm, directly following Prime News, in an attempt to increase ratings. This was ultimately unsuccessful and Prime TV cancelled the programme on 8 August 2005 due to poor ratings. Holmes returned to host a one-hour weekly current affairs/interview programme, which was still called Holmes, and screened on Thursday evenings. In 2006, the show was relaunched as a strictly entertainment-oriented talk show and screened on Wednesday evenings. It did not return in 2007, but two "specials" were filmed. For most of 2007, Holmes' work for Prime consisted solely of a weekly opinion segment, broadcast Sunday nights as part of Prime News.

In late December 2004, Prime announced it had acquired New Zealand broadcast rights for the new series of Doctor Who, one of its highest-profile imported shows, which went on to screen in June 2005 to generally good ratings.

In 2005, Prime announced that it would broadcast a minimum of 5.5% of local programmes, following recommendations from NZ On Air.

From 6 October 2005, Prime showed a weekly programme called New Zealand's Top 100 History Makers, where a brief biography of notable New Zealanders was shown as ranked by a panel of experts. The final episode, screened on 17 November 2005, showed the rankings of these people as a result of votes collected from the public via text and Internet.

In November 2005, Sky Television purchased Prime for NZ$30 million. The deal was subject to Commerce Commission approval and undisclosed conditions. On 8 February 2006, following receipt of Commerce Commission clearance, Sky Television purchased Prime New Zealand from Australian-based Prime Television. The acquisition of Prime by Sky Television saw a range of shows screened on Sky channels now included on Prime, these shows included American Chopper and MythBusters, which screen on the Discovery Channel.

In December 2005, it was announced that Prime had secured the 2006 free-to-air delayed broadcast of Rugby Union from TV3.

On 4 September 2006, the network relaunched with a modified logo, already seen in print advertisements, and new on-air branding.

In April 2008, Prime switch to broadcasting in a lower quality anamorphic widescreen 16:9 format following the lead of other Freeview and Sky channels. Previously they had opted to use the more proportionally scaled letterbox format for 16:9 content. They like other Kordia PAL analogue broadcasters are using a 14:9 letterbox format on their PAL simulcast.

Prime signed a deal with CBS Television Distribution to air exclusive first run content from 1 January 2013.[1]

From 2018, Love Island will start playing on this channel shifting from TVNZ 2.

Current Prime News opening titles

From launch Prime broadcast local newscasts in Christchurch and Hamilton on weeknights at 5:30pm. Christchurch's bulletin was anchored by Vanessa Rawson, with Mei Taare anchoring Hamilton's bulletin. Both bulletins ran for half and hour, but due to intense competition for local news in Christchurch and a lack of viewership, both bulletins were cancelled. Prime launched a nightly news bulletin – branded as Prime News – First at 5:30, from 2004. Unlike their early foray into local news, the new bulletins were screened nationwide and as a result, held a stronger national focus.