Interfax: Privately-owned Russian TV channel announces return of live broadcasts

(Interfax – Moscow, February 9, 2015) The Dozhd television channel is resuming live broadcasts, which were temporarily suspended while the channel was in the process of moving to a new television studio.

“From today, the Dozhd television channel is based at a new studio at the Flakon design centre. We have almost finished setting up the new studio, and in the next few hours we will be resuming live broadcasts,” says a statement issued by the channel on Monday [9 February].

After being dropped by the major cable operators, Dozhd lost 80 per cent of its audience, halved its staff headcount and organized a public telethon to raise funds. In addition, Dozhd’s landlord, which was leasing premises to the channel at Krasnyy Oktyabr [a complex in central Moscow], refused to renew its lease agreement with the channel. The landlord provided no explanation for the decision.

It emerged on 20 October that Dozhd’s landlord at the Krasnyy Oktyabr complex had informed the television channel that it would have to vacate its premises by 15 November.

Dozhd’s director-general, Natalya Sindeyeva, said that the channel had previously had an agreement to occupy the premises until the end of January, at which point Dozhd planned to move to the Krasnaya Roza business centre.

The television channel was forced to move part of its operation to the Moskva-Siti business centre, to which other media assets owned by N. Sindeyeva and the channel’s investor, Aleksandr Vinokurov – the Slon.ru internet portal and the Bolshoy Gorod magazine – had previously moved. The television channel also arranged a temporary studio in premises located virtually right next to Krasnyy Oktyabr, in the editorial offices of the magazine Snob.

In December 2014, Snob’s management asked Dozhd to vacate the premises, as they were due to be refurbished as a club and restaurant. At the time, Snob’s director-general, Marina Gevorkyan, told Interfax that at no point did the magazine have a rental agreement with Dozhd, and that the television channel’s occupancy of the premises amounted to help given by the magazine.

Subsequently, the television channel took the decision to broadcast from an apartment belonging to a member of staff. The apartment was equipped with studios and workstations for journalists. Broadcasts from the apartment continued for around two months, after which Dozhd’s management announced that the channel would be moving to the Flakon design centre.