Red ATB (Asociación Teledifusora Boliviana) is a Bolivian free-to-air television channel. Its origins date back to 20 October 1984 in La Paz, when Paceña de Television (Channel 9) began broadcasting. In the late 1980s the name was changed to ATB. The channel is one of the largest networks in Bolivia.
History Background In the 1970s Hugo Banzer, then president of the Republic of Bolivia,Hugo Banzer Suárez appointed Raúl Garafulic Gutiérrez as general manager of Bolivian TV,http://www. bolivia.com/noticias/AutoNoticias/DetalleNoticia17266.asp who owned most of the shares of the Pucro mining group. It was Garafulic's first contact with the media, which prepared him to own his own TV channel. In 1984 Garafulic created the Illimani de Comunicaciones company to exploit media outlets. on 20 July 1983, Channel 9 of La Paz, then relayer of Televisión Boliviana.
It was in April 1984 that the state media monopoly was broken by the opening two channels in the city of Santa Cruz de la Sierra: Universal Richards channel 5 (also known as Canal 5 Tele-Sat) and Cruceña de Televisión channel 13. This accelerated the launch of Paceña de Televisión. Garafulic joined the businessman who owned Telecine, Gonzalo Chiappe, and Juan Carlos Costas Salmón to open his channel. Notified that it was dangerous to open a pirate TV channel in the heart of the city, he moved to Ciudad Satélite in the Telecine studios to make his first broadcast on the air. An improvised studio was set up and on 20 October 1984, Paceña de Televisión was born. Chiappe and Costas acted as presenters and Juan Carlos Costas introduced himself as the general manager of Channel 9. Raúl Garafulic did not appear in the first broadcast of the channel, fearful of being arrested for operating a pirate TV channel.
Paceña de Television (1984–1987) Once the trauma of the start of broadcasts had passed, the following Monday the 22nd, Paceña de Televisión settled in a building on Romecín Campos street in San Jorge and began broadcasting from there. Paceña's daily broadcasts began at 3 in the afternoon and the broadcast closed at midnight. On Saturdays channel 9 broadcast from 5 in the afternoon until midnight and on Sundays it had two broadcasts: a morning one at 10:00 p.m. and another evening at 3:00 p.m. closing at midnight.
Among the first programs of Paceña de Televisión, the relevant shows were: Blanco y Negro, Tres son Multitud and Los Magnificos. The telenovelas El Rafa and La Mestiza served to fill the programming slots of the first few months. Also notable are Lalo LaFaye as host of a game show, Óscar Peña Franco as press director and Johnny Nogales, host of the main newscast called Nueva Imagen.
In 1985, due to the emergence of more private TV channels, Paceña de Televisión had to start broadcasting earlier. From Monday to Friday from noon to midnight. On Saturdays from 9:00 a.m. and on Sundays at the same time. Paceña moved to new studios on Avenida 6 de Agosto next to Rimpolio, a company that sells furniture. The new TV studios gave more space to the channel's productions and Vicky Suazo and Miguel Maldonado joined the group of presenters with Clip Show in the afternoons. Paceña's studio was set up in a building that was adapted as a TV studio, but it did not meet the international specifications for television.
That year the broadcast of the Viña del Mar Festival also began, and the new transmitter was inaugurated, reaching 1 kilowatt of power.
In 1985, the alliance with Millicom International was also consolidated, for the deployment of its own microwave network, which would later become the Red Nacional.
In the general elections of 1985, Paceña de Televisión formed a network with Cruceña de Televisión and Cochabambina de Televisión called Red Tricolor and it was the first time that personal computers were used to do the count of the votes. In the same way, Paceña began the broadcast of Cine Trasnoche on Saturdays at midnight, which had good ratings for the station.
In 1986 Paceña made its first major broadcast of sporting events by broadcasting the FIFA World Cup held in Mexico under the leadership of the Echavarría brothers. At the end of that year, those responsible for channel 9 issued a press release in which they notified their clients and viewers that the Red Nacional would begin in May in the cities of Oruro and Cochabamba.
ATB Red Nacional (1987–1992)
In May 1987, the Asociación de Teledifusoras Bolivianas network was born with the union of channels 9 from La Paz, 8 from Oruro —created on 8 May 1987— and 4 from Cochabamba -created on 7 January 1987– The link of microwaves was provided by Millicom International that designed, assembled and executed a network of repeaters throughout three departments of the national territory.
As an emblem program of the National Network, A Todo Bingo was born, hosted by Lalo LaFaye, and Bingo Show a subsequent program with international guests. A Todo Bingo made a raffle of bingo balls that people had to buy and fill as they left. A filled card meant Bingo. The development of the program was done through a computerized system that gave the name and location of the winner.
ATB Red Nacional began broadcasting successful Venezuelan telenovelas in its primetime sector. Other outstanding programs of this time are The Transformers, G.I. Joe, the broadcasts of Formula 1. The broadcast schedule was extended to 7:00 a.m. from Monday to Friday and from 8 on Saturdays and Sundays.
In 1987, ATB and Teleoriente, owned by Grupo Monasterio, signed an agreement by which Canal 9 de Santa Cruz was added to the Red Nacional as a partner. Channel 9 of La Paz premiered its mobile unit. Johnny Nogales resigns and Carlos Mesa temporarily assumes the leadership of the central newscast
In 1988, ATB expanded to the south, reaching the departments of Potosí, Sucre and Tarija. Broadcasts began in Trinidad in 1989, but the link was very complicated due to the number of rivers and jungles that cross the route between the departments of Beni and Cochabamba, called Isiboro Sécure.
In 1990, ATB Red Nacional broadcast the Italia 90 World Cup, again hosted by the Echavarría brothers. That same year, ATB La Paz moved to its new studio on Avenida Argentina, in the Miraflores neighborhood. In 1991 a computer graphics system from Silicon Graphics arrives at ATB. Óscar Dorado joins to lead Más Deporte and Jacqueline Jiménez in the Jacky Show. A program from the production company PAT is added: De Cerca
In 1992, the Televisa network bought 30% of ATB, thus introducing Mexican telenovelas and programs to the national network's programming.
ATB and Televisa (1992–1995)
ATB becomes the Televisa channel in the country.
In 1993, with an alliance of third parties from Toei Company (Japan), series from the aforementioned company were broadcast, both anime that at the time were also considered animated series and series of the tokusatsu genre.
In 1994, ATB Red Nacional and CDT broadcast the USA 94 World Cup together with Televisión Boliviana. The match between the Bolivian team and Germany is the match with the highest audience in the history of Bolivian TV.
In 1995 the partnership between the Monasterio Group and Illimani de Comunicaciones ended and ATB was left off the air in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, due to the fact that the Monasterio Family, with its own alliances, started the national television network project Unitel. Together with Ernesto Asbún, ex-owner of the Taquiña brewery, they buy the ABC network from Banco Mercantil and in this way ATB can broadcast again in Santa Cruz.
That same year ATB exclusively broadcast the Copa América Uruguay 95.
The Media Conglomerate (1995–2002)
With his sights set on La Razón, Raúl Garafulic makes a proposal to the owners, the Canelas family, and takes over the largest newspaper in the country. Together with ATB, part of the shares of Bolivisión, 100% of La Razón and shares in the daily Opinion, El Nuevo Día, Extra; 30% of shares in RTP, Radio Metropolitana and Doble Ocho Latina; the ownership and management of Vida Sana, La Gaceta Jurídica, Viva el Diario Deportivo and another small part in Bolivian Times; in addition to reference percentages in magazines such as Cosas and the 6 de Agosto cinema. Outside the media, Garafulic was a shareholder in the AFP Previsión of BBVA and LAB Together with his partner Ernesto Asbún. Illimani de Comunicaciones had become a huge media octopus with a presence in the press, radio and television.
On 24 April 1996, the ATB Network began broadcasting the CONMEBOL France 98 Qualifiers where it broadcast the matches of the Bolivian Soccer Team away against Ecuador, Venezuela, Argentina, Peru and Colombia live for all of Bolivia, so the channel broadcast the 3 matches of those South American qualifiers for France 98 also live for all of Bolivia.
In February 1997, ATB began broadcasting via satellite through Intelsat in the Bolivian MUX. For the return signal, it continued to use Entel's microwave network.
In 1997, ATB broadcast the Copa América Bolivia 97 and for this it bought a large amount of equipment, mainly mobile units that made possible the links to La Paz, Santa Cruz, Cochabamba, Sucre and Oruro
In 1998, ATB broadcast the World Cup France 98 together with Bolivian Television. The comments were made by Lorenzo Carri.
The network started to digitize its equipment in 1999.
In October 2000, the Spanish group PRISA (Promotora de Informaciones Sociedad Anónima), a Spanish company, bought the share package that was owned by Televisa, leaving the Mexicans out of their business. Apart from ATB Red Nacional, PRISA buys the preferred shares in La Razón.
Garafulic made huge investments in his communications group, such as the purchase and installation of a gigantic Goss printing press that was barely brought up to the Alto Auquisamaña neighborhood. But the loss of control over ATB and La Razón occurred because he lost the support of ADN due to his confrontation with Minister Guiteras; the surprising growth of Unitel; the problems caused by the Lloyd Aéreo Boliviano and the sale of its Pucro mine.
Garafulic had debts with PRISA and this Spanish company, faced with a lack of cash, took over the entire stock package of La Razón and ATB Red Nacional.
The short reign of PRISA (2002–2007) PRISA gave a lawsuit to ATB in April 2003 after a conflict between the two emerged over an increase in capital, demanding an increase in US$11.2 million plus interest rates involved. On June 30, it was announced that Prisa would auction its shares in Bolivia, on July 15, for a value of US$6.25 million, after Garafulic repeatedly refused to pay a loan acquired from the Sabadell bank, shared with PRISA. The auction was later suspended due to a lack of bidders.
In October 2003, ATB announced an agreement with American production company Anderson Productions, from Connecticut, to produce segments for its sports news program, Deporte Total. The first dispatch produced by the company was a summary of a friendly match between Bolivia and Honduras.
Raúl Garafulic died on November 21, 2003, victim of an air accident. He was the president of the network at the time.
Once owners of the two largest media outlets of Grupo Garafulic, due more than anything to an economic factor and not to interest in the company and not in the Bolivian market, PRISA managed for about four years with more desire to sell all the shares and recovering the money invested than continuing to grow. Finally, in 2007, PRISA sold the shares of the Bolivian media to Akaishi Investments, a Spanish company.
In 2005, ATB was the most-watched private network.ATB celebra 21 años con un claro liderazgo en la Tv