Celestial Tiger Entertainment

Celestial Tiger Entertainment
Formerly Tiger Gate Entertainment (2008-2011)
Type Joint venture
Industry Entertainment
Founded 2008
Headquarters Suite 1603, Kwun Tong Harbour Plaza, 182 Wai Yip Street, Kwun Tong, Hong Kong SAR, China
Key people
Todd Miller
(President and CEO)
Products
Brands
Owner Astro Overseas Limited
Parent Saban Capital Group
Lionsgate
Celestial Pictures
Website www.celestialtiger.com

Celestial Tiger Entertainment (CTE), formerly Tiger Gate Entertainment, is a diversified media company based in Hong Kong that operates pay television entertainment channels in Asia and oversees Lionsgate distribution rights in Greater China and Southeast Asia. It is a joint venture co-owned by Saban Capital Group, Lionsgate and Celestial Pictures.

Overview

Celestial Tiger Entertainment was founded in 2008 as Tiger Gate Entertainment, as a joint venture between private media investment firm Saban Capital Group and entertainment company Lionsgate. Pay television channels Kix and Thrill were later launched in August 2009.

Celestial Pictures Limited joined Tiger Gate Entertainment in late 2011 adding the already established Celestial Classic Movies and Celestial Movies to the company's channel lineup. Following this partnership, the company was renamed Celestial Tiger Entertainment and the high definition (HD) feed was added to existing channels for territories in Asia.

In 2013, cHK was launched in Singapore with Hong Kong celebrities Bernice Liu, Him Law and Liu Kai Chi hosting a media event to promote cHK as a Hong Kong general entertainment channel.

Lionsgate partnership

CTE owns the Shaw Brothers film library and leverages a library of film and TV from Lionsgate. In February 2012, YOU On Demand Holdings and Lionsgate announced deal to show a number of Lionsgate films on a Transactional Video On Demand (TVOD) and Subscription Video On Demand (SVOD) basis in China. In 2013, CTE sold over 1700 hours of Lionsgate TV series and movies including Anger Management, The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2, and the Hunger Games franchise to broadcasters and media platforms in southeast Asia and China as part of a regional distribution deal, CTE also expanded its Southeast Asian distribution deal with Lionsgate to cover Japan and Korea and sold a further 700 hours of TV series and feature films in an SVOD deal with MediaCorp’s Toggle digital platform in Singapore.

Channels

Celestial Tiger Entertainment operates the following channels:

  • Celestial Movies - A channel featuring current Asian films and entertainment news
    • Available in Malaysia, Brunei, South Korea, Indonesia, Philippines, and Singapore, Also Upcoming in Philippines, Thailand, Myanmar.
  • Celestial Classic Movies* - Featuring classic Hong Kong Chinese films
    • Available in Australia, Myanmar, Cambodia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Malaysia.
  • Celestial Movies Pinoy** - Filipino and English dubbed, Original Language subtitles in English Asian movie channel distributed and marketed by Viva Communications.
    • Available only in the Philippines via Cignal TV Channel 40 SD.
  • cHK - Local Hong Kong entertainment and showbiz news channel
    • Available only in Singapore until 2021
  • CM+ - Featuring the latest blockbusters and exclusive movies from across Asia
    • Available only in Singapore via Singtel TV Channel 571.
  • Kix* - Action, MMA, TV series, reality television and extreme sports
    • Available in Hong Kong, Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore, Myanmar and Vietnam, formerly available in Malaysia and Thailand. From October 2020, this channel is launched across Africa.
  • Thrill* - Horror, thriller and suspense
    • Available in Hong Kong, Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore and Myanmar, formerly available in Thailand and Malaysia.
  • Miao Mi* - Mandarin Kids Channel.
    • Available in Thailand, South Korea.

* Distributed in the Philippines by Creative Programs
** Joint Venture with Viva Communications