VICE Media Group renews partnership with SBS Australia
London/Sydney. Tuesday 15th December 2020. VICE Media Group has announced the continuation of its partnership with Australian broadcaster, SBS, with a renewed content deal for its SBS Viceland TV channel, and SBS digital platforms.
The agreement includes more than 1,000 hours of VICE Media Group content available to Australians through SBS, with exclusive access to more than 600 hours of new, original programming, including VICE TV documentary features and series, as well as content from the new VICE World News strand and original productions from VICE Studios.
Announcing the deal, Kate Ward, President of VICE Studios, said: “We are thrilled to be continuing our landmark partnership with SBS in Australia. In SBS we have a partner who shares our deep commitment to storytelling through premium programming that resonates with this powerful generation of young people.”
Adding: “This multi-year commitment is testament to the strength and depth of VICE’s creative programming across factual, lifestyle, documentary, investigative journalism and current affairs which, alongside the world-renowned VICE brand, attracts and retains youth audiences in Australia.”
The deal extends an already successful partnership between VICE and SBS which began in 2016 with the launch of SBS Viceland, a free-to-air television channel bringing Australians a unique and curated mix of VICE programming alongside other SBS content.
Peter Andrews, Head of Network Programming, SBS, said: “SBS Viceland plays a special role in our network celebrating diversity, exposing people to new cultures and ideas, and helping us all to better understand the world around us. We’re excited to be continuing to offer Australians compelling, boundary-pushing stories, spanning culture and current affairs, through our content partnership with Vice, and are looking forward to bringing local audiences an impressive line-up of new and exclusive Vice programming.”
Titles for upcoming premiere on SBS Viceland include:
From Vice TV: the third season of the ratings-winning pro wrestling documentary series Dark Side of the Ring alongside the newly announced expansion of the franchise, Dark Side of The 90s, which will explore the decade’s most captivating pop-culture moments. Also airing soon on SBS Viceland will be the explosive series While The Rest of Us Die which unmasks how the elite are saved and normal people die when catastrophe strikes, documentary strand VICE VERSA, a new series of independent documentary specials that
serve as a hub for compelling storytelling that challenges the status quo, as well as the hotly anticipated third season of Hamilton’s Pharmacopeia.
From VICE World News (VWN): programming includes the investigative documentary series Wet Markets Exposed, which looks at the underbelly of wildlife wet markets across the globe, and Fringe Nation, a new series which explores whether the actions of those at the fringes have a disproportionate - and irreversible - impact on the United States.
In addition, the acclaimed feature documentary Mayor from Emmy-winning director, editor and composer David Osit, will be available exclusively on SBS Viceland as part of VWN’s The Short List with Suroosh Alvi, a collection of the world’s best documentaries curated by VICE founder Suroosh Alvi.
VICE Studios’ new upcoming three-part production for Channel 5, Jack the Ripper: Hidden Victims (w/t), which provides a new take on historical crime documentaries and debunks the myths and mistruths around the infamous murderer Jack the Ripper, will also premiere in Australia on SBS Viceland.
VICE Studios launched a new Distribution group earlier this year with a catalogue of over 1000 hours of premium VICE content that includes VICE News Tonight, the most Emmy Nominated show in 2020, VICE TV’s highest rating show Dark Side of the Ring, which has recently been renewed for a third season, as well as popular titles like Hate Thy Neighbour with Jamali Maddix and Karley Sciortino’s Slutever. The ever expanding catalogue also includes hundreds of hours of new content every year such as the new documentary strand VICE VERSA, the epic drag racing show Donkmaster and the returning hit series Black Market with Michael K. Williams.
The deal with SBS underpins VICE’s continued growth and success in the wider Asia Pacific region which has seen multi-platform audience growth of over 200 percent and a slew of award wins which includes a number of accolades from the Society of Publishers in Asia and the Kyoorius Awards in India as well as most recently, the award for Best Current Affairs Programme or Series at the 2020 Asian Academy Creative Awards for our documentary Man Woman #MeToo (Discovery Channel India). Recent VICE Studios productions in the region include the ambitious original series, Open Secrets and Point Blank for VMG’s VICE World News strand and high-profile audio projects such as Extremes for Spotify Australia.
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ABOUT VICE STUDIOS VICE Studios is a global production division within VICE Media Group delivering premium original programming across documentary, scripted and film. With development and production teams in the USA, Canada, UK, Europe, Asia-Pacific and Latin America, VICE Studios cuts through culture, delivering stories that are popular, human and spotlight the unexpected for audiences around the world.
VICE Studios also houses VICE’s new licensing and distribution group, with a catalogue of over 900 hours of programming created across the VICE Media Group, across a range of genres from documentary to lifestyle to Vice News.
VICE Studios upcoming original productions include a six-part documentary series, Pride for FX, Moments Like This Never Last premiering at DOCNYC in November, and Last Looks and Big Rad Wolf for Quibi. Launched in 2017, VICE Studios productions include Chris Smith's Emmy-nominated Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond and Fyre: The Greatest Party that Never Happened (Netflix); feature film The Report starring Adam Driver and Annette Bening (Amazon); Diego Osorno's 1994 (Netflix), Dark Side of the Ring (VICE TV), AKA Jane Roe (FX), and Satanic Verses (BBC).
ABOUT VICE MEDIA GROUP VICE Media Group is the world’s largest independent youth media company. Launched in 1994, VICE has offices in 35 cities across the globe with a focus on five key businesses: VICE.com, an award-winning international network of digital content; VICE STUDIOS, a feature film and television production studio; VICE TV, an Emmy-winning international television network; a Peabody award-winning NEWS division with the most Emmy-awarded nightly news broadcast; and VIRTUE, a global, full-service creative agency with 25 offices around the world. VICE Media Group’s portfolio includes Refinery29, the leading global media and entertainment company focused on women; PULSE Films, a London-based next-generation production studio with outposts in Los Angeles, New York, Paris and Berlin; i-D, a global digital and bimonthly magazine defining fashion and contemporary culture; and Garage, a digital platform and biannual publication converging the worlds of art and design.
ABOUT SBS As Australia’s most distinctive broadcaster, SBS holds a unique place in the Australian media landscape, inspiring all Australians to explore, respect and celebrate our diverse world and in doing so, contributes to an inclusive and cohesive society. Today, SBS is a multiplatform media organisation with a free-to-air TV portfolio spanning five distinctive channels in SBS, National Indigenous Television (NITV), SBS VICELAND, SBS Food and SBS World Movies; an extensive radio and audio content network providing more than 60 communities with services in their own language; and an innovative digital offering, including streaming destination SBS On Demand, available to audiences anytime and anywhere. Visit us at sbs.com.au.