Media UK

Men and Motors

Formerly 'Granada Men and Motors', Men and Motors is a men's lifestyle television channel. It is the last remaining station operated by Granada Sky Broadcasting, a joint venture set up by Granada Television (now part of ITV plc) and British Sky Broadcasting in 1996. Although ITV plc is now the sole owner of GSB, Sky will receive 49.5 per cent of any proceeds (net of liabilities) if Men & Motors is sold.

It was rumoured that Men & Motors would be closed in favour of ITV4 when the latter launched in Autumn 2005. As a possible precursor to this, the channel dropped its Videoguard encryption on Sky Digital on 1 July 2005, falling to Free-to-air status, and replaced its late-night risque adult content with archive drama and documentries. This had the unexpected effect of increasing audience numbers to the extent that it is remains on the air with ITV4 launching alongside it. On Freeview, the restricted bandwidth available to ITV caused them to take the ITV News Channel off the air after 6pm in order to accommodate ITV4. The News channel closed soon after, due to major competition from Sky News and BBC News 24.

It is intended that from 19 April 2006 onwards, ITV Play will launch on Freeview, replacing Men and Motors. The channel's fate is yet to be decided, but sources have stated a possible timeshare between ITV Play and Men & Motors. Some or all material in this page has been adapted from the Men and Motors entry (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Men_and_Motors), or others, in Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org), the free encyclopedia.