Discovery Communications Sees Continued Loses with OWN

OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network is a new channel owned by owned by Discovery and Ms. Winfrey’s Harpo Inc. Since its launch last year OWN has had an unfortunate start. It has had below average ratings and numerous management turnovers. This past summer Winfrey took over as chief executive in an attempt to get the programming on track. Oprah also plans to host a new part-time interview show which is said to be called “Oprah’s Next Chapter.” This show is said to start the end of January.

David Zaslav, Discovery CEO, said he believes viewer percentage will rise when Ms. Winfrey’s new prime-time show makes its debut. During this appearance, Mr. Zaslav also said that the amount of money spent on last-minute ad advertising contracts has only slightly lessened in the U.S. Mr. Zaslav also mentioned that there will be little bit of a slowdown in the U.K. as well. But made sure to add that advertisers will not be backing out of contracts for the first calendar quarter of 2012 any more quickly than they did last quarter, and more importantly sales have remained solid.