Dionne Rose, Business Reporter

Eighteen months after acquiring Jamaica News Network (JNN), the RJR communications group says that it wants to position its new entity to capture three to five per cent of the cable viewership.

On Tuesday, Lester Spaulding, chairman and managing director of RJR Communications Group officially presented the cable network company to potential customers as an entity that will provide content to a specific niche market.

Gary Allen, deputy-managing director at RJR with responsibility for JNN said the company has been positioning itself to offer content to the business sector.

"The surveys show that the viewership to cable television is fairly high probably somewhere around half and half in terms of local TV and cable. In the breakdown, however, of the cable channels watched, there is no single cable channel that has as much as five per cent. They are all below five per cent in terms of their viewership," he said.

Business market

"So we recognise that means in terms of watching cable, it is a niche approach and so JNN is positioning itself within that set of cable channels as a niche, which is focus on business and business related news, so that we can try and carve out our share of that business market that is direct niche," said Allen.

He said the company has not yet done any survey measurement of market share as the company was now officially launching.

Allen said that the RJR group has invested J$30 million for new programme and satellite distribution this year. He, however, pointed out that the overall operation of JNN exceeds this figure.

He said that since May it has expanded its range through satellite transmission, and essentially covers most of the island. He said by next April, the group wants to start transmitting to the region and North America.

"Our plan is this financial year, for JNN to be a solid business as well as solid technical and programming channel and then having laid a solid foundation, then we will build on that by going to expand into the Caribbean and North America," said Allen.

dionne.rose@gleanerjm.com