In 1973, the Hong Kong government issued licences for additional terrestrial television broadcasters, ending TVB's six-year monopoly as the sole free-to-air television company in Hong Kong. A group of shareholders formed a consortium to contest the licence; the six major shareholders were Commercial Radio, Jardines, Sing Tao Daily, Wah Kiu Yat Pao, The Kung Sheung Daily News, and the Lam family. The licences were awarded on August 10, with Rediffusion Television receiving licences for two television stations, while Commercial Television only received one licence for a station broadcasting in Cantonese. The station launched at 6:00 pm on September 7, 1975. Its logo was a hexagon formed from six angled lines, representing the Six Arts in Confucian philosophy, as well as the six major stakeholders. At the time, the station was reportedly mocked for using the Six Arts as the inspiration for its logo, as 御書數 in Cantonese sounds similar to the phrase 預輸數. One of the station's licensing conditions was to air two hours of educational programming every week night, with no commercial interruptions. Such programming on the station was primarily oriented at adults, covering topics such as automechanics, interior design, and foreign languages. The station struggled to break even as a result of this requirement. An attempt was made to resurrect the failing station in July 1976 when Selina Chow, then Assistant general manager of TVB was drafted in as its new general manager. A significant amount of money was spent on producing drama series; The number of staff trebled, and the cash-burn rate escalated under Chow. On August 21, 1978, the station announced it was ending its operations, its 800 staff were laid off and the company was declared bankrupt on October 19. Following the station's collapse, the government concluded that a third commercial television station "did not appear viable".
Aftermath
For over three decades after Commercial Television's demise, TVB and Rediffusion Television remained a duopoly of terrestrial TV broadcasters in Hong Kong. ATV's license was not renewed in 2015, and ceased broadcasting just before midnight on April 1. 2016. ViuTV was issued a television license in 2015, and started a digital-only terrestrial television operation starting on April 2, 2016, using terrestrial television frequencies formerly used by ATV. A third television license was issued in 2016 to Fantastic Television, but the station was not given over-the-air frequencies to broadcast its content. Much blame flew around about the reasons for the failure. The Government was blamed for restrictive conditions of the licence; the management was blamed for bad programme scheduling and failing to control escalating costs; shareholders were blamed for having the short-term mentality of property developers. However, the Government blamed the collapse on the unwillingness of the shareholders to inject more capital, after it had spent its entire HK$20 million within one year. Many TV series were brought by TVB and ATV and TVB seldom rebroadcast them. The station's building on Broadcast Drive was briefly used by TVB as a studio building, until it became RTHK's Television House in 1987.
