Universo is an American pay television channel owned by the NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises subsidiary of

NBCUniversal NBCUniversal Media, LLC is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate corporation owned by Comcast and headquartered at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, United States. NBCUniversal is primaril ...

. The network serves as a companion cable channel to the NBCUniversal's flagship

broadcast television Broadcast television systems (or terrestrial television systems outside the US and Canada) are the encoding or formatting systems for the transmission and reception of terrestrial television signals. Analog television systems were standardized b ...

network

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters ...

and, to some extent, its Spanish network

Telemundo Telemundo (; formerly NetSpan) is an American Spanish-language terrestrial television network owned by NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises, a division of NBCUniversal, which in turn is owned by Comcast. It provides content nationally with prog ...

. Aimed at Hispanic Adults between the ages of 18 and 49, the majority of its programming – which is tailored toward

bilingual Multilingualism is the use of more than one language, either by an individual speaker or by a group of speakers. It is believed that multilingual speakers outnumber monolingual speakers in the world's population. More than half of all Eu ...

audiences – consists mainly of sports, scripted and reality series, and music programming. The network is headquartered in

Miami Springs, Florida Miami Springs is a city located in Miami-Dade County, Florida. The city was founded by Glenn Curtiss, Glenn Hammond Curtiss, "The Father of Naval Aviation", and James Bright, during the famous "land boom" of the 1920s and was originally named Coun ...

, while its

master control Master control is the technical hub of a broadcast operation common among most over-the-air television stations and television networks. It is distinct from a production control room (PCR) in television studios where the activities such as swit ...

operations are housed at the

CNBC CNBC (formerly Consumer News and Business Channel) is an American basic cable business news channel. It provides business news programming on weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., Eastern Time, while broadcasting talk sh ...

Global Headquarters in

Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey Englewood Cliffs is a borough in Bergen County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, whose population at the 2010 United States census was 5,281.Empresas 1BC as GEMS Television. In 2001, the network was acquired by Telemundo and re-branded as mun2. The network was renamed NBC Universo in February 2015 to align it with Telemundo's sister English-language network NBC. , NBC Universo's programming was available to approximately 39.326 million pay television households (33.8% of cable, satellite and telco customers with at least one television set) in the United States.

Background

The network was launched on October 10, 1993, as GEMS Television, under founding owner Empresas 1BC. Cable television provider Cox Cable (now

Cox Communications Cox Communications, Inc. (also known as Cox Cable and formerly Cox Broadcasting Corporation, Dimension Cable Services and Times-Mirror Cable) is an American digital cable television provider, telecommunications and home automation services. It ...

) acquired an ownership interest in the network the following year. The network's programming was aimed towards Latino women.

As mun2

In 2001, GEMS was purchased by the Telemundo Communications Group (then a joint venture led by

Sony Pictures Entertainment Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Sony Pictures or SPE, and formerly known as Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc.) is an American diversified multinational mass media and entertainment studio conglomerate that produces, acq ...

and

Liberty Media Liberty Media Corporation (commonly referred to as Liberty Media or just Liberty) is an American mass media company controlled by chairman John C. Malone. The company has three divisions, reflecting the company's ownership stakes in Formula On ...

), and revamped its programming format to target younger viewers; it was renamed mun2, a name chosen to reflect the "two worlds" that Latino Americans live in (the name being a Spanish-language pun on "mundo" and the number 2, which is pronounced like "mundos" or "worlds"). Its initial lineup included programs from Telemundo's then sister company

Columbia TriStar Television Columbia TriStar Television, Inc. (abbreviated as CTT) was an American television production and distribution company that was active from 1994 to 2002. It was operated as the third name of the early television studio Screen Gems and the fou ...

(now

Sony Pictures Television Sony Pictures Television Inc. (abbreviated as SPT) is an American television production and distribution studio. Based at the Sony Pictures Studios complex in Culver City, it is a division of Sony Entertainment's unit Sony Pictures Enterta ...

), including repeats of Spanish language adaptations of ''

Charlie's Angels ''Charlie's Angels'' is an American crime drama television series that aired on ABC from September 22, 1976, to June 24, 1981, producing five seasons and 115 episodes. The series was created by Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts and was produced by ...

'' (''Angeles'') and ''

The Dating Game ''The Dating Game'' is an American television game show that first aired on December 20, 1965, and was the first of many shows created and packaged by Chuck Barris from the 1960s through the 1980s. ABC dropped the show on July 6, 1973, but it ...

'' that had aired on Telemundo as part of a failed programming revamp in 1998 in an attempt to counterprogram its rival,

Univision Univision () is an American Spanish-language free-to-air television network owned by TelevisaUnivision. It is the United States' largest provider of Spanish-language content. The network's programming is aimed at the Latino public and inclu ...

. In addition, mun2 ran blocks of programming from the

Home Shopping Network HSN, an initialism of its former name Home Shopping Network, is an American free-to-air television network owned by the Qurate Retail Group, which also owns catalog company Cornerstone Brands. Based in the Gateway area of St. Petersburg, Fl ...

's Spanish language network Home Shopping Español (HSE) daily from 12:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.

Eastern Time The Eastern Time Zone (ET) is a time zone encompassing part or all of 23 states in the eastern part of the United States, parts of eastern Canada, the state of Quintana Roo in Mexico, Panama, Colombia, mainland Ecuador, Peru, and a small por ...

. The network's most well known series was the candid reality series '' I Love Jenni'', which featured the life of

banda Banda may refer to: People *Banda (surname) *Banda Prakash (born 1954), Indian politician *Banda Kanakalingeshwara Rao (1907–1968), Indian actor *Banda Karthika Reddy (born 1977), Indian politician *Banda Singh Bahadur (1670–1716), Sikh warr ...

/ ranchero singer

Jenni Rivera Dolores Janney "Jenni" Rivera Saavedra (July 2, 1969 – December 9, 2012) was an American singer known for her work within the Regional Mexican music genre, specifically in the styles of Banda, Mariachi and Norteño. In life and death, sever ...

. After her death in a plane crash near

Monterrey Monterrey ( , ) is the capital and largest city of the northeastern state of Nuevo León, Mexico, and the third largest city in Mexico behind Guadalajara and Mexico City. Located at the foothills of the Sierra Madre Oriental, the city is ancho ...

on December 9, 2012, the final season of the series earned the highest season average of any mun2 original program in its history, reaching a total of 5.5 million people across all of its telecasts during the season's 18-week run. It also ranked as the #1 show among all Hispanic cable networks in every key demographic during its Sunday night premiere. The series on-demand traffic increased, with over eight million

video streams Streaming media is multimedia that is delivered and consumed in a continuous manner from a source, with little or no intermediate storage in network elements. ''Streaming'' refers to the delivery method of content, rather than the content it ...

on mun2.tv, and over one million

video on demand Video on demand (VOD) is a media distribution system that allows users to access videos without a traditional video playback device and the constraints of a typical static broadcasting schedule. In the 20th century, broadcasting in the form of ...

views.

As Universo

left, Logo used until January 17, 2017. On December 24, 2014, NBCUniversal announced that it would relaunch mun2 as NBC Universo on February 1, 2015, to coincide with the network's Spanish-language broadcast of

Super Bowl XLIX Super Bowl XLIX was an American football game played to determine the champions of the National Football League (NFL) for the 2014 season. The American Football Conference (AFC) champion New England Patriots defeated the National Football Co ...

. The relaunch of the network under the

name and

peacock logo The National Broadcasting Company ( NBC) has used several corporate logos over the course of its history. The first logo was used in 1926 when the radio network began operations. Its most famous logo, the peacock, was first used in 1956 to h ...

was designed to reflect the broadcaster's commitment to the Spanish-language television market. Eight months prior to the relaunching announcement, at NBCUniversal Hispanic Enterprises and Content's upfront presentation at

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

's Frederick P. Rose Hall on May 13, 2014, the company announced that NBC Universo would be revamping its programming. The new line-up would increase its focus on sports coverage (which included the re-organization of Telemundo's sports division as Telemundo Deportes, a branch of the English-language

NBC Sports NBC Sports is an American programming division of the broadcast network NBC, owned and operated by NBC Sports Group division of NBCUniversal and subsidiary of Comcast. The division is responsible for sports broadcasts on the network, and it ...

division), primarily in preparation for its broadcast of the 2016 Summer Olympics and its assumption of Spanish-language cable rights to FIFA tournaments (such as the

2018 FIFA World Cup The 2018 FIFA World Cup was the 21st FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial world championship for men's national football teams organized by FIFA. It took place in Russia from 14 June to 15 July 2018, after the country was awarded the hosting righ ...

), which began with the

2015 FIFA U-20 World Cup The 2015 FIFA U-20 World Cup was the twentieth edition of the FIFA U-20 World Cup since its inception in 1977 as the FIFA World Youth Championship. The competition took place for the first time in New Zealand, the third time on Oceanian soil after ...

. In February 2017, the channel's name was shortened to Universo as part of a brand refresh.

Programming

Universo's programming consists of sports, original scripted drama series, reality series largely centered on popular Hispanic celebrities, movies, and music videos and music-related magazine programming; it also broadcasts series originating from Telemundo and networks operated as part of sister division

NBCUniversal Cable NBCUniversal Television and Streaming is the television and streaming arm of NBCUniversal, and the direct descendant and successor of the former division NBCUniversal Television Group, which existed from 2003 to 2019. History NBC Broadcasting In ...

, made up of original series from sister networks Syfy and

USA Network USA Network (simply USA) is an American basic cable television channel owned by the NBCUniversal Television and Streaming division of Comcast's NBCUniversal through NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. It was originally launched in 1977 as Mad ...

, which incorporated Spanish subtitles. To reflect its audience, Universo does not exclusively air programming in Spanish, airing a mix of shows presented in English, dubbed into Spanish and incorporating Spanish language subtitles, and programs presented interchangeably in both languages. Music programming on the network during its existence as mun2 usually consisted of a mix of

music video A music video is a video of variable duration, that integrates a music song or a music album with imagery that is produced for promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing devi ...

s in English and Spanish from a variety of genres. In early April 2009, mun2 introduced two new music video-oriented shows called ''Indie y Nuevo'' (a program focusing more on independent artists, which has since been cancelled) and ''The Urban Tip'' (focusing on R&B, rap and

reggaeton Reggaeton (, ), also known as reggaetón and reguetón (), is a music style that originated in Panama during the late 1980s. It was later popularized in Puerto Rico. It has evolved from dancehall and has been influenced by American hip hop, ...

videos). In late December 2009, the network dropped its overnight block of

infomercial An infomercial is a form of television commercial that resembles regular TV programming yet is intended to promote or sell a product, service or idea. It generally includes a toll-free telephone number or website. Most often used as a form of dir ...

s that aired daily from 3:00 to 6:00 a.m. Eastern Time, and replaced it with additional music video programming either in the form of ''Reventon Mix'' (focusing on contemporary Latin party music) or ''Morning Breath'' (featuring a selection of videos from various artists). In January 2010, the network also began broadcasting a weekly block of feature films on Friday nights.

Sports programming

Universo broadcasts Spanish-language sports programming in conjunction with the Telemundo Deportes branch of the

NBC Sports Group NBC Sports Group is a division of NBCUniversal that is responsible for NBC Sports' media properties, encompassing the NBC television network's sports division as well as day-to-day operation of the company's sports-oriented cable networks and oth ...

. Since the

2015 FIFA Women's World Cup The 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup was the seventh FIFA Women's World Cup, the quadrennial international soccer championship contested by the women's national teams of the member associations of FIFA. The tournament was hosted by Canada for the ...

, Universo is the Spanish-language cable rightsholder of FIFA tournaments through

2026 Predicted and scheduled events * January 1 ** In the United States, books, films, and other works published in 1930 will enter the public domain, assuming there are no changes made to copyright law. ** ''Soup to Nuts'', the first on-scree ...

. In January 2010, NBC Universal announced that the channel would continue to broadcast Mexican soccer games (under the brand ''Fútbol Mexicano''); most of the games aired to date were English-language telecasts of matches featured on Telemundo's ''Fútbol Estelar'' broadcasts. In February 2010, mun2 debuted ''mun2 Sports Arena'', a half-hour sports news program that aired on Sunday evenings. The network held English-language rights to a 2010 FIFA World Cup qualifiers match between the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

and

Mexico Mexico ( Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guate ...

on August 12, 2009. mun2 offered a free preview for the day of the match. On July 23, 2013, NBC Sports announced that Telemundo and mun2 would broadcast NASCAR events in Spanish in beginning in 2015, as part of NBC's new rights deal to cover the second half of the Cup Series and

Xfinity Series The NASCAR Xfinity Series (NXS) is a stock car racing series organized by NASCAR. It is promoted as NASCAR's second-tier circuit to the organization's top level Cup Series. NXS events are frequently held as a support race on the day prior to ...

season. As a prelude to the new contract, mun2 broadcast the opening event of the Toyota Series—NASCAR's Mexican series, at

Phoenix International Raceway Phoenix Raceway is a 1-mile, low-banked tri-oval race track located in Avondale, Arizona, near Phoenix. The motorsport track opened in 1964 and currently hosts two NASCAR race weekends annually including the final championship race since 2020. ...

during the weekend of

The Profit on CNBC 500 The Shriners Children's 500 is a NASCAR Cup Series stock car race held annually at Phoenix Raceway in Avondale, Arizona since 2005. It is one of two Cup Series races at the track, the other being the Season Finale 500. William Byron is the defe ...

on February 28, 2014. Through NBC Sports' contract to televise the

Premier League The Premier League (legal name: The Football Association Premier League Limited) is the highest level of the men's English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Foo ...

, the network began airing Spanish-language simulcasts of select matches broadcast in English on

NBCSN NBCSN was an American sports television channel owned by the NBC Sports Group division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. It originally launched on July 1, 1995, as the Outdoor Life Network (OLN), which was dedicated to programming pri ...

with the 2013–14 season. Through NBC's rights agreement with the NFL, mun2 carried its first Spanish simulcast of an NFL game, airing a

Thanksgiving Thanksgiving is a national holiday celebrated on various dates in the United States, Canada, Grenada, Saint Lucia, Liberia, and unofficially in countries like Brazil and Philippines. It is also observed in the Netherlander town of Leiden ...

matchup between the

Seattle Seahawks The Seattle Seahawks are a professional American football team based in Seattle. The Seahawks compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) West, which they rejoined in 2002 a ...

and

San Francisco 49ers The San Francisco 49ers (also written as the San Francisco Forty-Niners) are a professional American football team based in the San Francisco Bay Area. The 49ers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the league's National ...

on November 27, 2014; the re-branded channel has served as the Spanish-language broadcaster of the Super Bowl during years NBC holds the rights. NBC had proposed using Telemundo to act as a Spanish-language simulcast partner for years following its 2001 purchase of the network, but this did not occur until the Premier League agreement.

List of programs broadcast by Universo

Current

;Original programming * '' El Vato'' (April 17, 2016 – present) * '' I Love Jenni'' (reruns) * '' Larrymania'' (October 7, 2012 – present) * '' The Riveras'' (October 16, 2016 – present) * ''Latinx Now!'' (October 3, 2018 – present) ;Acquired programming * ''

12 Corazones ''12 Corazones'' (, ''12 Hearts'') was a Spanish-language dating game show produced in the United States for the television network Telemundo from 2005 to 2017, based on its namesake Argentine TV show format. The show was filmed in Los Angeles an ...

'' * ''Atrapados en la aduana'' * ''

El Socio ''The Partner'' or ''The Associate'' (Spanish:''El socio'') is a 1928 novel by the Chilean writer and politician Jenaro Prieto.Bizzarro p.609 Adaptations The story, about a financially struggling man who invents a fictitious business partner na ...

'' (July 22, 2018 – present) * '' Encarcelados'' * ''Escuela para maridos'' * '' Fuerza especial de fugitivos'' * ''La frontera'' * ''La ley de Laredo'' * '' Mi historia de fantasmas'' * ''Motivo para matar'' (May 27, 2018 – present) * ''Narcos: Guerra antidrogas * '' Pandilleros'' * ''Paraíso perdido'' * '' Preppers'' * ''

Prison Break ''Prison Break'' is an American serial drama television series created by Paul Scheuring for Fox. The series revolves around two brothers, Lincoln Burrows ( Dominic Purcell) and Michael Scofield ( Wentworth Miller); Burrows has been sentenc ...

'' * '' ¿Quién da más?'' * '' Seguridad de frontera: Australia'' * '' Seguridad de frontera: Canada'' * '' Seguridad de frontera: USA'' *'' Son of Anarchy'' * '' The Walking Dead'' ;Reruns of

programming * '' Caso Cerrado'' * ''Historias de la Virgen Morena'' * ''Exatlón Estados Unidos'' (July 17, 2018 – present) ;Sports * ''

'' (August 16, 2013 - prsesent) * ''

FIFA World Cup The FIFA World Cup, often simply called the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior List of men's national association football teams, men's national teams of the members of the ' (FIFA), the ...

'' (June 14, 2018 – present) ;Telenovelas * ''

Pasión de gavilanes ''Pasión de Gavilanes'' (international title: ''Hidden Passion'') is a Colombian telenovela written by Julio Jiménez. It is produced by RTI Colombia in conjunction with the Telemundo network and with the participation of Caracol TV company. ...

'' (June 8, 2017 – present) * ''

La hija pródiga ''La hija pródiga'' is a Mexican telenovela that premiered on Azteca Uno on October 23, 2017, is an original story by José Ignacio Valenzuela produced by Ana Celia Urquidi for TV Azteca, which stars Isabel Burr and Christian de la Campa. The s ...

'' (October 1, 2018 – present) * '' Los herederos del Monte'' (December 3, 2018 – present)

Former

* ''Chiquis 'N Control'' * ''Day in Day Out'' * ''El Show'' * ''Fugitivos De La Ley: Los Angeles'' * '' Gran Hermano: La Novela'' * '' Guerra de ídolos'' * ''Jenni Rivera Presents: Chiquis & Raq-C'' * ''

La Patrona ''La Patrona'' () is a Spanish-language telenovela produced by Telemundo and Argos Comunicación. It is a remake of the 1984 Venezuelan telenovela '' La dueña''. It premiered on Telemundo on January 8, 2013, replacing Corazón brave , and ende ...

'' * ''

Law & Order ''Law & Order'' is an American police procedural and legal drama television series created by Dick Wolf and produced by Wolf Entertainment, launching the '' Law & Order'' franchise. ''Law & Order'' aired its entire run on NBC, premiering o ...

'' * '' Law & Order: LA'' * '' Los Thunderbirds'' * '' Lugar Heights'' * ''mun2 Shuffle'' * '' Milagros de Navidad'' * ''Niño Santo'' * ''One Nation'' * '' Operación Repo'' * ''

Pablo Escobar, el Patrón del Mal ''Escobar: El Patrón del Mal'' (international title: ''Pablo Escobar, The Drug Lord''; also known as ''Pablo Escobar: El Patrón del Mal'') is a 2012 Colombian telenovela produced and broadcast on Caracol TV, based on a true story about the lif ...

'' * ''RPM Miami'' * ''Reto superhumanos'' * ''Se Habla Rock!'' * ''

Sons of Anarchy ''Sons of Anarchy'' is an American action crime drama television series created by Kurt Sutter for FX. Originally aired from September 3, 2008 to December 9, 2014, ''Sons of Anarchy'' follows the lives of a close-knit outlaw motorcycle club o ...

'' * '' South Park'' * '' Stan Lee's Superhumans'' * '' Shockwave '' * ''Suelta la sopa'' (July 16, 2018 – August 17, 2018) * ''

The Chicas Project The Chicas Project is a reality television show on the bilingual television network mun2 that chronicles the adventures of the “Chicas,” two VJs for mun2, Yasmin Deliz and Melissa Barrera. The show wrapped its fourth season in 2009. In this ...

'' * ''The Look'' * ''The mun2 Shift'' * ''Vivo'' * ''Welcome to Los Vargas'' * ''

WWE ECW ''WWE ECW'' (also known as ''ECW on Sci-Fi'' and later ''ECW on Syfy'', or simply ''ECW'') is an American professional wrestling television program that was produced by WWE, based on the independent Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) promoti ...

'' (January 9, 2009 – February 19, 2010) * ''

WWE Raw ''WWE Raw'', also known as ''Monday Night Raw'' or simply ''Raw'', is an American professional wrestling television program produced by WWE that currently airs live every Monday at 8 p.m. ET on the USA Network in the United States. The show f ...

'' (October 5, 2005 – 2020) * ''

WWE NXT ''WWE NXT'', also known as ''NXT'', is an American professional wrestling television program. It is produced by the American professional wrestling promotion WWE, featuring performers from the promotion's NXT brand division. The show current ...

'' (2010) * ''

WWE SmackDown ''WWE SmackDown'', also known as ''Friday Night SmackDown'' or simply ''SmackDown'', is an American professional wrestling television program produced by WWE that as of currently airs live every Friday at 8 p.m. ET on Fox. Fox Deportes simul ...

'' (October 2, 2010 – September 29, 2019)

Notes and references

External links

* {{Sports television in the United States Telemundo NBCUniversal networks NBC Sports Music video networks in the United States Television channels and stations established in 1993 Spanish-language television networks in the United States