MultiChoice Group

Early years

In 1983, Koos Bekker wrote a paper at Columbia University describing the idea that led to M-Net, and along with two others pitched the idea to Naspers, which acquired a 26% share, leading to Naspers executive Ton Vosloo serving as chair of the board. M-Net lost money in its first few years.

Expansion

In 1993, M-Net was divided into two divisions, one focused on transmission of the entertainment channels and the other on cellphone operations, signal distribution and subscriber management. This second division became MultiChoice. The company had been granted a licence to broadcast into Namibia in 1991 and, as a result, in 1996 MultiChoice Africa was established.In 1992, analogue services were launched in 20 African countries and lasted until 1996 when digital services replaced them. This division, called DStv , had first been launched in South Africa on October 6, 1995, making it the first direct-to-home digital pay-TV service outside the US.In 2002, a "Dual-view" decoder was launched by DStv which allowed the simultaneous viewing of two different channels from a single satellite feed. In 2006, a service to mobile devices was trialed and officially launched in 2011 as DStv Mobile .In October 2011, MultiChoice Nigeria launched GOtv, an affordable terrestrial platform & a compatriot to DStv, which broadcasts all channels from DStv Access and some from DStv Compact packages in 11 Sub-Saharan African countries.MultiChoice broadcasts in 50 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, including Cape Verde and Madagascar. Local language programme content is available in French and Portuguese in certain African territories, as well as the 11 official languages within South Africa.

IPO and consolidation

In September 2018, Multichoice's parent company Naspers announced that it would separate its video entertainment business from the bulk of Naspers and list it separately on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange . The new company would be called MultiChoice Group and would include MultiChoice South Africa, MultiChoice Africa, Showmax Africa, and Irdeto. The listing took place on 27 February 2019, with share code MCG. The share was immediately eligible for inclusion in the JSE Top40, the list of the largest 40 shares by market capitalisation.In October 2020, French media company Groupe Canal+ acquired 12% stake in MultiChoice.In November 2020, MultiChoice acquired 20% stake in Nigeria's sports betting company, BetKing with plans to launch it in South Africa. In June 2021, they increased their stake to 49%.As of September 13, 2022, French media company Groups Canal+ retains a 26,26% stake in the company.