Prime TV, previously known as PTV Prime, was one of the first Pakistani channels to be available in the UK. Last week Prime TV celebrated a year of being available free-to-air on Sky Digital. The channel has gone from strength to strength to provide wholesome family entertainment, as well as award winning news and information.

We caught up with the Chief Executive Officer of Prime TV UK, Haroon Khan, to find out the shift from news orientated programming to general entertainment, amongst other subjects in its successful eight years on air.

What is your role at Prime TV and when did you join?
Prime TV is my vision; which turned into reality eight years ago. As an individual I play the role of a CEO and as my team says, I am their best player!

What has been the biggest coup since your tenure at Prime TV UK?
The biggest coup I can proudly say is Prime being the first channel to enter this market at a time when not many may have even thought of doing so! It has also had the share of the biggest subscribers for six consecutive years and has been a platform for introducing and promoting many TV personalities with in the community.

Prime TV recently was rebranded from PTV Prime, what was the reason behind this? (legal or simply a revamp)
Prime TV's rebranding was simply to move forward by creating a new look and by showcasing moderate – and improvised content through our screen. However, there were other socio–economic issues and views which underlined the ethnic media as being publicised as printing and broadcasting programmes which were politically or culturally targeted to a specific audience. Immediately, after the incidents of the 9/11 and the 7/7 the media – especially the ethnic media in the UK was being labelled as one community or one nation – representative, Prime obviously carrying the flag for the last eight years was marked as one of these even if we never did promote any similar content to others. Like I said, we had to move to a wider and more challenging audience – the South Asians – and create a twist in our content - which is now visible that Prime TV is an entertainment channel – catering to all.

The decision to go free to air – was done through proper strategic planning; at that moment majority of the big – wigs (South Asian) Channels were encrypted and with Prime TV’s brand registration for the last eight years. This decision was easy to the fact that we would now cater to our current and much wider and bigger audience. And I think so far we have done a good job 'til now! We are still PTV-Prime on the Sky EPG.

How would you define the programming output for Prime TV compared to your rivals?
Prime TV is an entertainment channel and caters to everyone and anyone. As said earlier it's the quality that matters and with the limited – market size and audience the competition becomes harder but not something which is impossible to achieve. Prime TV, being a British Asian channel has the advantage of providing a platform to the Brit – Asian Pakistanis to express their views and reach out to the target audiences. Prime TV, therefore can offer the South Asians –Pakistani a base, where the mainstream has failed to do so.

What sort of arrangement (if any) do you have with PTV Global? Prime will always be the first choice!

Last year, Prime TV turned a free-to-air channel, what was the reason behind this move? You are now solely dependent on commercial revenue, how has this affected the channel since it went free-to-air?
Prime TV as being the premier Pakistani channel initially had the biggest number of subscribers and to go free to air was simply to reach and cater to a much wider audience – South Asians.

The commercial aspect of any channel not only Prime depends on its advertising – revenues and I personally think that as you are watched by more people thus branding on a free to air channel even by the mainstream market – becomes noticeable.

How do you think Prime TV has grown since its overhaul last year?
Well! I would say we have done major reshuffling with in our infrastructure and some very positive measures have been implemented. But most important is that we have build a relationship with our viewers by improvising on our timings / synchronising our play list with our EPG – keeping standards of promoting the best in entertainment and creating an awareness through our other resources as web site and print campaigns. Fairly Good!

With the UK TV market saturated with large amount of Asian channels, Prime TV stands independent with only one offering, are there plans to launch any other Prime brand channels in the UK?
The market is already saturated. To cover 2.0 million Indians and 1.0 million Pakistanis, there are 28 South Asians channel. To bring more channels, any team would need to come in with a clear positioning on what they want to do with a brand.

What are your views on the state of the UK Asian TV market?
Will Prime bring more brands? Let's see! There are two market and audience splits here – one being the Bollywood content and the other is the Pakistani programming and lastly the music – and few live shows which are the only local relevant element to the British Asians. Honestly, until we do not speak to the British Asians in their language, we will lose our audience to the mainstream channels.

With other channels increasing live programming output, it seems like Prime TV has reduced its live shows, why is this?
Entertainment through – factual programming is not easy as compared to the Live – interaction shows. The coverage of local events on Prime TV – highlights the cultural and local activities by giving it the local flavour essence and in maintaining a relationship with its viewers.

The other reason for not having many Live Shows on the channel is simple and straight as the South Asian media is still very young the selection in terms of the finding right candidate to deliver the goods on the screen is very limited but I am sure there will be more opportunities in the coming years.

How do you plan to compete with your rivals in the coming months?
Competition is always healthy!

Rival channels are taking up new initiatives to keep interaction with viewers at a maximum level, have you got any new technology enhancements in the pipeline that would benefit viewers?
Telecoms, being our first business - we exactly know how we can relate to the two. The main objective of the two is to communicate, to their users / viewers. We have in house facilities of providing premium numbers and call centres for our viewers and currently we use the same for our 'Jee Aayan Noo' – Live show.

How do you see Prime TV UK in a year from now?
I would always see Prime at the top not only in the year to come but many such years to follow.

Quickfire:
- Kyunki... / Kasamh Se
- Haroon / Mustafa Zahid
- Aag / The Muzik
- Cricket / Football
- Night In / Night Out
- SRK / Aamir Khan
- Apprentice / Big Brother
- Comedy / Drama