NEW (TV station)

NEW is a television station broadcasting in Perth, Australia, and is a member of Network Ten. Out of the three commercial stations, NEW generally rates the lowest overall, but usually rates highest in its target demographic (people aged 16–49).

NEW broadcasts in digital television on VHF Channel 11 from Carmel, located in the Perth Hills. Its studios are located in Dianella. NEW broadcasts reasonably good quality 1080i high definition digital programming, the second-highest quality in Perth. The callsign NEW-10 was chosen for promotional purposes when the station first launched.

The station's studios were formerly host to the facilities of the regional Western Australian television station WIN Television WA (from 1999 to 2007) until WIN Corporation bought out competitor STW-9 in June 2007 and moved all WA operations to their studios.

History

NEW was the last of the Ten stations in major metropolitan cities to go to air. The reason for the late launch (in comparison to other VHF 0/10 stations, which were 20 years before) was the smaller market size. Though this was true in the early days of television, it ceased to be the case in the 1980s, by which time the Perth market exceeded Adelaide in value so a situation existed where two stations in Perth shared a market as large as that of three stations in Adelaide. Because the demand for air time was high, advertising rates were higher than in Adelaide. The Perth market was therefore very profitable for the stations but was providing viewers with less choice than they had in other capital cities. The case for a new licence was made to ACMA, then the Australian Broadcasting Tribunal by Brian Treasure, one of the founders of Perth's first commercial station TVW-7 who was sacked by a hostile board in 1975. In April 1984, the Minister for Communications, Michael Duffy, called for applications for a third licence