Another in the strong portfolio of specialty channels owned at the time by Toronto’s CHUM Limited, CLT was licensed in 1996, but did not begin broadcasting until September 1999. It was Canada’s only national educational television specialty service, and was owned by Edmonton’s Access Media Group, which was in turn owned by CHUM Limited. Many of its programs (including repeats of some US network series) were connected to credit courses at various Canadian universities.
A CRTC hearing on an application by CTVglobemedia to acquire the assets of CHUM Limited was held on April 30th 2007. Among the CHUM assets acquired by CTVglobemedia in the approved deal were seven television stations, some 33 radio stations, and 21 specialty channels, including CLT.
In August 2008, the CRTC approved the acquisition of CLT from CTVglobemedia, by Corus Entertainment, and in October Corus announced the rebranding of the speciality channel as Viva, a women’s specialty channel targeting ‘boomer’ women aged 40 to 64.
On September 29th 2009, the U.S. Oprah Winfrey Network announced that they had finalized a licensing agreement with Corus Entertainment that would enable Corus to add the OWN Network to its portfolio of Canadian specialty services.
In March 2011, Corus were scheduled to replace Viva with OWN, the Oprah Winfrey Network, that had debuted in the U.S. on January 1st. OWN would be inheriting a potential vewing audience of around six million homes.
Ownership: Corus
Start Year: 2008 to 2011