Zuku eyes West Coast expansion

East African pay TV platform Zuku wants to extend distribution of its channels on both linear and mobile in West Africa following the appointment of a new chief commercial officer.

Charles Murito, formerly director of business development for Africa and the Middle East at Turner Broadcasting, joined Zuku’s parent company Wananchi Programming in the newly created CCO role earlier this week.

He is charged with monetising the channel and programme assets that Zuku has grown since it launched in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania three years ago and reports to Wananchi Programming MD Hannalie Bekker.

Murito told C21 he was particularly keen to see the new Zuku Kids channel, which launched a fortnight ago, and factual-skewed network Zuku Life roll out into West African territories, particularly Ghana and Nigeria.

He said: “One of the unique selling points of Zuku Kids is it’s the first African kids channel focused on sub Saharan African children in terms of the on air ident and look. I want to grow out that channel beyond East Africa and I believe we can get good traction around that.

“We’re looking at linear channels, VoD and especially mobile opportunities across Africa. In Africa a lot of people have a mobile as their only screen, not as a second or third screen as it is in Europe, so going forward that is a big opportunity to deliver content.”

Murito had been with Turner since 2008 and prior to that worked for Warner Bros entertainment and MTV networks in the UK, Africa and US.

His arrival at Wananchi follows the recent appointment of Richard Alden as the group’s new CEO. Alden had previously been the COO and takes over from Richard Bell who has moved into a non-executive vice chairman position on the Wananchi board.