Middle East Broadcasting Center (MBC) is a media conglomerate set up in 1991 in London. It moved its headquarters to Dubai in 2002. The group operates a spate of television and radio channels, including MBC1, MBC2, MBC3, MBC4, MBC5, MBC Drama, and Al Arabiya, available across the Middle Eastern region. It also runs channels in Egypt and Iraq. The group also owns the radio stations MBC FM and Panorama FM. In August 2023, MBC announced plans to launch a cultural television channel in cooperation with the country’s Ministry of Culture.
Media assets
Television: MBC1, MBC MASR, MBC MASR 2, MBC2, MBC3, MBC4, MBC5, MBC Drama, MBC Drama Plus, MBC Max, MBC Bollywood, MBC Power, MBC Action, MBC Wanasah, Al Arabiya, Al Hadath, MBC USA, MBC Iraq, MBC Egypt, MBC Egypt 2
Radio: MBC FM, MBC Panorama FM, MBC USA
State Media Matrix Typology: Captured Public/State-Managed (CaPu)
Ownership and governance
The Saudi government had a 60% stake in MBC following a deal with Waleed Al Ibrahim, the group’s founder, who retained the remaining 40%. The share purchase is part of the Saudi government’s larger plan to seize assets controlled by businessmen it suspects of corruption. The Saudi government owns its stake in MBC via Al Istedamah Holding, a state-run company.
Two observers covering Saudi Arabia we talked to in May 2024 say this is only a pretext to gain control over as many media outlets as possible. A group of these businessmen, including Ibrahim, were detained by the Saudi government at the Ritz Carlton hotel in Riyadh back in 2017. The MBC deal was announced right after Ibrahim and three of his brothers were released from detention in January 2018.
In January 2024, MBC began to float part of its shares on the Tadawul stock exchange. The shares in the company saw their value spike by over 30% on the first day on the bourse. The initial public offering (IPO) was managed jointly by HSBC and JPMorgan Chase. The decision to go public is part of the Saudi government’s attempts to privatize some of its assets in line with the goals in its Vision 2030 Strategy aimed at diversifying the Saudi economy.
Following the IPO, the government retained a 54% stake in MBC, controlled through Istedamah Holding Company, while MBC’s chairman, Waleed bin Ibrahim Al Ibrahim, was left with a 36% stake.
Source of funding and budget
No publicly available financial data about MBC’s performance was available in the past, but since the company began floating its shares, its financial transparency has improved. The company is mainly funded through commercial revenues (mostly advertising) and subscriptions (following the growth of its VoD platforms), according to an analysis carried out by the Media and Journalism Research Center (MJRC). In 2023, the company increased its revenue by 6.2% yearly to SAR 3.7bn (US$ 987.7m). The company’s net earnings surged by 44.8% to SAR 69m (US$ 18.5m).
MBC’s OTT platform, Shahid, had a total of 3.98 million subscribers in 2023. The service generated SAR 836m (US$ 223m), a 51% increase compared to the previous year.
Editorial independence
Since the Saudi government took over the group, the editorial coverage of MBC channels has been closely controlled by the Saudi authorities. MBC’s leverage is used by the kingdom to counter propaganda and content from Iran and Qatar.
No domestic statute or independent assessment or oversight mechanism to validate the editorial independence of MBC’s outlets has been identified.
July 2024