A+E will roll out Lifetime this year

A+E Networks will launch its female-skewing Lifetime channel in at least two major territories this year. Official word on the roll outs is expected in the first half of this year with two or more international versions of the channel following before end-2012.

To date the channel, which A+E took control of in a deal announced in August 2009, has been solely a US cable offering, despite A+E’s large international channels business.

“There will absolutely be launches of Lifetime in major markets this year,” Sean Cohan, senior VP, international A+E Networks, told TBIvision. “We have been waiting for the US to get the proposition right and define what the channel is and now we are getting ready for multiple international launches.”

Asked about TLC, the female-skewing channel Discovery has got into 100 million international homes since launching it outside the US in 2010, Cohan said: “This is a big target group, there are a lot of women in the world and there is definitely room for more than one channel for them.”

A+E Networks’ senior VP, international programming and marketing, Christian Murphy, said that plans are underway to order local programming for the international Lifetime channels. “We have got ideas about what we want to do, we will most likely kick off with local versions of our hit formats to get up and running.”

Cohan added that more roll outs of the A&E channel are also a possibility. A standalone A&E launched in Australia this month on the Foxtel platform. The only other international versions of the channel are the Canadian and Latin offerings.