SCTVF Forum Finally Brings All the Players Face to Face
BEIJING & CHENGDU --- Full details of the SCTVF Forum to be held in Chengdu on October 27th have been released by co-organizers, the SCTVF Organizing Committee and CMM Intelligence (HK), publishers of China Media Monitor.
The details confirm that in a radical departure from previous academic presentations associated with the SCTVF, the organizers have received official SARFT backing for the most representative international industry debate on Chinese TV programming ever held on the mainland.
Reflecting their recent high and low profile efforts at the highest levels of the central government, major US and Australian interests are well represented with Star TV President Gareth Chang, Turner (Asia) CEO Steve Marcopoto and MTV (Asia) VP Richard Cunningham all presenting keynote addresses to the morning sessions.
The line up is equally impressive at the regional level with key presentations from Zhang Liang, Deputy Managing Director at Hongkong's TVBI, Hu Heyi, Assistant Vice President at TCS Singapore, HVD Malaysia's Daniel Leong and Kuang Kuaiyun from ATV Hongkong.
Reflecting the importance of media research to the circle of sustainable TV programming, the SCTVF Forum also provides a rare mainland platform for AC Nielsen's TV Research Manager Tan Zewei.
It is always difficult to choose mainland speakers able to speak for an industry of China's size and complexity, but the SCTVF Forum has managed to attract well placed Chinese executives with their own visions for the future.
The official SARFT Representative is Shen Xiangjun, Deputy Director of the SARFT Social Affairs Administration which is responsible for the healthy operations of Chinese TV on a daily basis.
The Chinese keynote speaker in the morning session is CCTV Vice President Zhang Changming, who has taken a particular interest in international affairs for the national broadcaster during the change of Station President (see CMM passim) and who will address the Forum on the evolving nature of CCTV's unique model.
The collective might of Chinese producers is represented by Yuan Xiaobo, Managing Director of the China TV Program Agency, the largest international distributor of mainland Chinese TV programs and the pioneer in the success of Chinese TV dramas in regional Chinese language markets.
Naturally, the provincial level TV industry is well represented by representatives from Sichuan. These include Opening Words from Xi Yifang, Vice Secretary of the Standing Committee of the Sichuan Provincial Government and Sichuan RFT Bureau Chief / Sichuan TV President Wu Baowen.
Over 220 city level TV Stations are represented by City TV Stations Research Committee Secretary-General Wang Zhongxia, who is concurrently Deputy Chief
Editor at Xian TV, which currently chairs the industry body under the China Radio & TV Society.
Mr. Wang has been instrumental in building the Committee from an occasional meeting group to a practical network which has already generated major network projects, including China's largest network environmental TV production project in involving over 80 TV stations.
Representing the interests of over 100 cable systems is another man of great experience, Zhou Lin, Director of the Cable TV Stations Association Network and Program Director at Beijing Cable TV, one of the early pioneers of network affiliations with Chinese characteristics.
The SCTVF Forum will be jointly moderated by Madame Sun Jianying and Rowan Simons. Madame Sun is the SCTVF Program Market Director and concurrently the International Director of Sichuan TV. In the latter position, she has led SCTV's emergence as one of the few Chinese producer/broadcasters able to sustain sales to international markets in the documentary field.
Rowan Simons is the British Chairman of RSA Media Relations Limited and a Director of CMM Intelligence (HK) Limited. He is one of the longest serving foreign friends of Chinese television with 10 years experience working both sides of the camera at all levels of the industry. He is an adviser to CITVC, Beijing TV and the Shanghai and Sichuan TV Festivals and an honorary member of the Provincial TV Stations Liaison Group and the City TV Stations Research Committee.
To mark the occasion of the SCTVF Forum and to celebrate a decade of co-operation between SCTVF and RSA, a unique CMM-I Special Dossier with proprietary overviews of over 40 major foreign TV markets will also be released at the SCTVF Forum.
Compiled in association with leading industry publications including Television Asia, Television Europe, Television International and on-line service 365broadcast.com, the CMM Special Dossier on World TV paints a broad stroke picture of how the world's TV industry is dealing with the same issues facing China.
CMM subscribers unable to attend this conference will be able to purchase full transcripts from the SCTVF Forum in November.