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Super Channel files for creditor protection Allarco Entertainment, parent company of Canadian pay-TV movie network Super Channel, has filed for bankruptcy protection after struggling to build a subscriber base. Allarco called for protection from its creditors under the Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act. According to documents filed with the Court of Queen's Bench of Alberta, Super Channel has around 220,000 subscribers and liabilities that total C$139m (US$123.2m) and assets of C$68m.  The network, which launched in October 2007 after winning a licence a year earlier, had originally targeted 800,000 subs within its first four years, court documents said."We want to make it clear to our customer base that Super Channel is not bankrupt or in receivership," said Super Channel president Malcolm Knox, in a statement issued to affected programme suppliers. "Operations continue without interruption." Knox also attacked cable carriers in the statement, claiming they held too much sway over the channels they carried and did not respect the edicts of media regulator the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC). "Our biggest challenge has been accessing consumers using distributors that have become increasingly powerful vertically integrated companies and no longer take CRTC decisions seriously," he said. Allarco has also filed an undue preference complaint to the CRTC over cable platform Rogers' treatment of Super Channel. According to Canuck news site Cartt.ca, Allarco's affidavit claims: "Had Rogers performed its obligations to fairly promote and sell Super Channel programming to its customers, as other broadcasting distribution undertakings such as Bell TV have, the business would now have a customer base of some 350,000." There are two other movie players in Canada's pay-TV market: Astral Media's The Movie Network and Corus Entertainment's Movie Central. The Super Channel faces competition not only from those two Canadian channels, but also US channels such as Turner Classic Movies and American Movie Classics, both of which launched on Canadian airwaves in 2008. Adam Benzine 19 Jun 2009 © C21 Media 2009 
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