Nansei Broadcasting

Nansei Broadcasting (Japanese: 南西放送株式会社, Nansei Hōsō Kabushiki-gaisha) was established in July 1989 with the goal of operating a broadcasting business targeting Okinawa Prefecture and setting up an affiliate of Nippon Television (NNN/NNS) in the prefecture.

Ten influential local companies—Ryukyu Bank, Okinawa Bank, Okinawa Kaiho Bank, Okinawa Electric Power, Ryukyu Oil (now Ryuseki), Kanehide Headquarters, Okinawa Prefectural Agricultural Cooperative Central Association (now JA Okinawa), Ryukyu Bus (now Ryukyu Bus Transportation), Okinawa Sugar Manufacturing, and Shiroishi—invested in the company, along with Fuji Television (formerly Fuji Media Holdings) and others.^[1]

Overview

Currently, there are four commercial television networks in Japan, excluding TV Tokyo (TXN), which operates as a metropolitan commercial network. Initially, in Okinawa Prefecture, which had only two commercial stations on the VHF band, there was an aim to establish two UHF stations independently or simultaneously in the first half of the 1990s (spring 1993). However, Ryukyu Asahi Broadcasting (QAB), an affiliate of TV Asahi (ANN), eventually began operations in the fall of 1995, leading to the failure of the simultaneous opening of the two stations. Furthermore, due to the freezing of NTV's plan to expand into Okinawa, the initiative was put on hold, and the application for a broadcasting license was withdrawn. Subsequently, Nansei Broadcasting went bankrupt.^[2]