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Oprah Winfrey and Discovery Communications are teaming to create OWN, the Oprah Winfrey Network, a cable channel that will debut in 2009.
The channel will take the place of what is now the underperforming Discovery Health Channel, and will be available in more than 70 million homes, according to The New York Times. It will be half owned by Discovery and half by Harpo Inc., Winfrey’s production company. Discovery Health currently draws fewer than 200,000 viewers on average during prime time, according to SNL Kagan.
The channel will not initially carry The Oprah Winfrey Show, but when Winfrey’s option to end the top-rated syndicated daytime talk show comes up in 2010 or 2011, she could opt to move the show to the new channel at that time. Winfrey is also contributing her website, Oprah.com, to the new company.
Winfrey will continue to produce programming for other outlets. A new reality show, Oprah’s Big Give, will begin on ABC in March.
Winfrey was an initial investor in the Oxygen cable channel in 1998. She eventually cut many of her ties to the company, which was sold to NBC in October for $925 million. The difference between Oxygen and OWN, according to Winfrey, is that Oxygen did not reflect her voice and she did not participate in the development of content for the channel.
With the new network, Winfrey will have editorial control, she says. “I have a vision for what we want to accomplish with this network.”
Winfrey will be the creative force, chairwoman and president of the venture, according to the Los Angeles Times.
TV analysts are saying the move is another indicator of the fact that the four broadcast networks are losing influence as cable channels continue to draw viewers away from broadcast with their more targeted viewing.
“Fifteen years ago, I wrote in my journal that one day I would create a television network, as I always felt my show was just the beginning of what the future could hold,” Winfrey said in a statement. “For me, the launch of The Oprah Winfrey Network is the evolution of the work I’ve been doing on television all these years and a natural extension of my show.”
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