Business News Network

Business News Network (BNN) is a Canadian English language cable television business and economics channel, which airs business news and analysis. The Downtown Toronto-based station is owned by CTV Television Inc., a division of CTVglobemedia. Its day-to-day operations are run by CTV News.  It is the sister station of the CTV News Channel.

In The Beginning

The network was licensed in 1996 to a joint venture of Thomson Corporation (50%), WIC (25%), and Cancom (25%). It began broadcasting on September 1, 1999 under the name Report on Business Television (although using the abbreviation ROBTv), borrowing the name from The Globe and Mail's financial section "Report on Business".  In 2000, CanWest Global acquired WIC and its interest in ROBTv. As part of the agreement transferring WIC's interests in Cancom to Shaw Communications, CanWest acquired Cancom's share of the channel as well.

That same year, the two partners became in conflict with each other when CanWest acquired the Southam newspaper chain, including the National Post, the Globe's chief rival. Around the same time, Thomson transferred the Globe and its shares of ROBTv to Bell Globemedia, a newly formed media company which also included CTV, in which Thomson initially held a 20% interest. Following threats of legal action on both sides, CanWest agreed to sell its 50% to BGM, in exchange for Bell ExpressVu agreeing to carry a new CanWest-owned digital business news channel, "Financial Post Television", a channel which ultimately never made it to air.

BGM assumed full control of ROBTv in late 2001. Shortly thereafter, the channel was given a new logo and began to use only the full name of Report on Business Television, dropping "ROBTv".

Cue Business News Network

On March 12, 2007 Report on Business Television was renamed "Business News Network", although no channel format or schedule change occurred. The name change occurred to give exclusive rights to the "Report on Business" name to the Globe and Mail and for the channel to have its own identity. Network executives also stated that they were unhappy that viewers would sometimes pronounce the acronym ROBTv as "Rob" TV rather than "R-O-B" TV.

BNN On Air

A large majority of the programming found on BNN is produced in-house, although it also carries content from other sources including Bloomberg Television. Originally it was the Canadian broadcast partner of CNNfn, which closed in December 2004.

BNN features a televised stock ticker with real-time data from the TSX, NYSE, NASDAQ as well as many international exchanges. Based in Toronto, BNN also has a news bureau located at the NASDAQ Market Site in New York City's Times Square.

BNN attracts approximately 5,000 in-home rated regular viewers daily but has a strong viewership outside of the home (in gyms, restaurants, offices, etc.) which is not reflected in its ratings. This is a situation also faced by other networks with high out-of-home viewing patterns such as CNBC's worldwide operations.