Blue Ant Media Inc. is a Canadian broadcasting and media company headquartered in

Toronto, Ontario Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

. The company was founded by

Michael MacMillan Michael I. M. MacMillan (born 1957) is the CEO of Blue Ant Media, a privately held Canadian media company that creates and distributes engaging content in categories that span lifestyle, travel, music and entertainment. The company owns specialt ...

and formed in 2011 following the acquisition of

Glassbox Television Glassbox Television was an independent Canadian broadcasting and media company specializing in the operation of multi-platform broadcast and video-on-demand (VOD) channels, content production, and digital publishing. The company was formed in 2001 ...

. Its name was chosen in reference to

William Gibson William Ford Gibson (born March 17, 1948) is an American-Canadian speculative fiction writer and essayist widely credited with pioneering the science fiction subgenre known as ''cyberpunk''. Beginning his writing career in the late 1970s, his ...

's informal "Blue Ant" trilogy. The company owns both domestic and international television channels, studios, and publishing assets.

History

On December 22, 2011, Blue Ant Media announced that

Torstar Torstar Corporation is a Canadian mass media company which primarily publishes daily and community newspapers. In addition to the ''Toronto Star'', its flagship and namesake, Torstar also publishes daily newspapers in Hamilton, Peterborough, Ni ...

had acquired a minority stake in the company. On December 21, 2011, Blue Ant Media announced that it had entered into an agreement to purchase specialty broadcaster

High Fidelity HDTV High Fidelity HDTV was a Canadian licensed television broadcaster specializing in HD content. The company was founded in 2003 by co-founders John Panikkar and Ken Murphy, both of whom have been involved in the Canadian broadcasting industry for m ...

. It initially purchased 29.9% of the company with the remaining 70.1% acquired when the deal was approved by the

Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC; french: Conseil de la radiodiffusion et des télécommunications canadiennes, links=) is a public organization in Canada with mandate as a regulatory agency for broadcasti ...

. The acquisition was completed on August 1, 2012. On August 17, 2012, Blue Ant Media announced that it would be purchasing the specialty channel

Bold In typography, emphasis is the strengthening of words in a text with a font in a different style from the rest of the text, to highlight them. It is the equivalent of prosody stress in speech. Methods and use The most common methods in W ...

from the

Canadian Broadcasting Corporation The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (french: Société Radio-Canada), branded as CBC/Radio-Canada, is a Canadian public broadcaster for both radio and television. It is a federal Crown corporation that receives funding from the government. ...

for an undisclosed amount, conditional on government approval. After initially purchasing a 15% minority stake in Canadian publishing company Quarto Communications in the summer of 2011, Blue Ant Media purchased the remaining shares in the company in December 2012, which had been renamed Cottage Life Media. Bold would later relaunch under the Cottage Life brand. In April 2014, the company purchased a minority stake in the digital media company and

multi-channel network A multi-channel network (MCN) is an organization that works with video platforms to offer assistance to a channel owner in areas such as "product, programming, funding, cross-promotion, partner management, digital rights management, monetizati ...

Omnia Media. In so doing, they retained CEO Tamoor Shafi and Co-Founder Austin Long to focus on expanding its reach with brands. In November 2014, the company bought a majority stake in

Choice TV Eden (stylized as eden and formerly known as Choice TV) is a privately owned, national free-to-air television channel in New Zealand and has been on air since 2012. The channel features programs on topics such as: lifestyle, news, travel, reali ...

, marking their first international expansion. In December 2015, Blue Ant Media and

Smithsonian Networks The Smithsonian Channel is an American pay television channel owned by Paramount Global through its media networks division under MTV Entertainment Group. It offers video content inspired by the Smithsonian Institution's museums, research facilit ...

teamed to launch Blue Skye Entertainment, a new UK-based company exclusively focused on 4K content. In May 2017, Blue Ant Media bought the Asia-Pacific broadcaster Racat Group, including factual producer

NHNZ NHNZ, formerly Natural History New Zealand, is a New Zealand-based television production house. It works and co-produces with multiple major global broadcasters: Discovery Channel, Animal Planet, Discovery Science, A&E Television Networks, Natio ...

, Singapore-based studio Beach House Pictures, Sydney-based

Northern Pictures Northern Pictures is an Australian-based television production company, which develops and produces unscripted and factual television programs for multiple television channels in Australia and internationally. The company was founded by Sue Cl ...

, developer Runaway Play, and a majority stake in

ZooMoo ZooMoo is an international multilanguage pay television channel owned by Rock Entertainment Holdings that was first launched in Brazil in September 2013 in high definition (HD). On 4 April 2014, ZooMoo was launched in Singapore via Starhub. The ...

. The purchase was considered to be complementary to the Blue Ant's factual and nature-oriented programming. In February 2018, Omnia Media was renamed Blue Ant Digital Studios, coinciding with the launch of several new original series on

Facebook Watch Facebook Watch is a video on demand service operated by American company Meta Platforms (previously named Facebook, Inc.). The company announced the service in August 2017 and was available to all U.S. users that month. Facebook Watch's original ...

, and an accompanying expansion beyond video gaming content. In October 2018, Blue Ant acquired the Toronto-based Saloon Media. In December 2020, Blue Ant entered the

free ad-supported streaming television Free ad-supported streaming television, commonly abbreviated FAST, is a category of streaming television services which are available to consumers without a paid subscription, are funded solely by advertising, and stream traditional television prog ...

(FAST) market by launching HauntTV, a channel devoted to horror and supernatural programming, on

The Roku Channel The Roku Channel is an American over-the-top video streaming service owned and operated by Roku, Inc., which launched in September 2017. History In September 2017, Roku, Inc. launched a free, ad-supported streaming channel for its digital media ...

in Canada. It has since launched several additional FAST channels in Canada and the United States; including CrimeTime, TotalCrime, Homeful, and HistoryTime.Blue Ant Media launches HistoryTime on LG Channels
Real Screen, 2022-07-27

Assets

Television

A.Side TV A.Side TV is a Canadian English language specialty channel owned by Blue Ant Media. Originally focusing on music and pop culture programming, the channel currently broadcasts general entertainment programming. History As AUX (2009-2016) Originat ...

BBC Earth (Canadian TV channel) BBC Earth (formerly named Rush HD and radX) is a Canadian discretionary service channel owned by Blue Ant Media. The brand and much of its programming is licensed from BBC Studios, a subsidiary of the BBC that wholly owns the BBC Earth brand. The ...

BBC First (Canadian TV channel) BBC First is an entertainment subscription television channel featuring comedy, crime, drama and film programming, originating from UK and mostly from the BBC. The channel is wholly owned and operated by BBC Studios. The channel began rolling ou ...

Cottage Life ''Cottage Life'' is a Canadian magazine focusing on cottage lifestyle content. First published in the summer of 1988, the publication features how-to articles, buying guides, and tips on aspects of cottage living and lifestyle. Formally publish ...

Love Nature Love Nature is a Canadian-based specialty television channel. The channel broadcasts documentaries and television series related to wildlife and nature. The channel's Canadian operations are owned solely by Blue Ant Media, while the internationa ...

(Canada, EMEA) *

Makeful Makeful (formerly known as BiteTV) is a Canadian pay television channel owned by Blue Ant Media. It has transmittered from 299 Queen Street West since at least 2012. The channel was first launched on March 5, 2005, as BiteTV, and primarily aired ...

Smithsonian Channel (Canada) Smithsonian Channel is a Canadian pay television channel, owned and operated by Blue Ant Media. Minority partner is Smithsonian Networks, owners of the American channel, Smithsonian Channel, from which the brand is licensed and much of the progra ...

* T+E

Production companies

* Beach House Pictures (Singapore) * Blue Ant Digital Studios (Los Angeles) *

Look Mom! Productions Blue Ant Media Inc. is a Canadian broadcasting and media company headquartered in Toronto, Ontario. The company was founded by Michael MacMillan and formed in 2011 following the acquisition of Glassbox Television. Its name was chosen in referenc ...

(Toronto) *

(New Zealand) *

(Sydney) * Saloon Media Inc. (Toronto)

Print

Australian Geographic Australian Geographic is a media business that produces the ''Australian Geographic'' magazine, ''DMag'' magazine, specialist book titles, travel guides, diaries and calendars and online media. It published editions of the Australian Encyclop ...

* Cottage Life West * Outdoor Canada

Former

* Antenna Pictures (London) *

(New Zealand) *

HGTV HGTV (an initialism for Home & Garden Television) is an American pay television channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The network primarily broadcasts reality programming related to home improvement and real estate. As of February 2015, appr ...

(New Zealand) *

Blue Ant Entertainment Rock Entertainment (formerly RTL CBS Entertainment and Blue Ant Entertainment; stylized as ROCK entertainment) is a 24/7 Southeast Asian English-language television channel owned by Rock Entertainment Holdings. Launched in 2013, it was initially ...

(Asia-Pacific) *

Blue Ant Extreme Rock Action (formerly RTL CBS Extreme, Blue Ant Extreme and Rock Extreme; stylized as ROCK ACTION) is a Southeast Asian English-language movie channel serving Southeast Asia, owned by Rock Entertainment Holdings. Since its launched in 2014, it was ...

(Asia-Pacific) *

(Asia-Pacific and Latin America)

References

External links

* {{Blue Ant Media Television broadcasting companies of Canada Television production companies of Canada Companies based in Toronto 2011 establishments in Canada Mass media companies established in 2011