and Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan first announced a 50/50 joint venture to operate a free-to-air Arabic-language all-news channel on 29 November 2010. Adrian Wells, head of international news at Sky News, was appointed to lead preparations to launch the channel. In February 2011, Nart Bouran was hired as Sky News Arabia's first director of news. Bouran was previously director of television at Reuters. Yasser Thabet, former program director at Al Arabiya, joined Sky News Arabia as director of output in June 2011 and Nicholas Love was appointed as director of finance. Al-Waleed bin Talal, the second-largest shareholder in 21st Century Fox, which has a 39.1% stake in BSkyB, announced in September 2011 that he would launch another Arabic news channel, Alarab News Channel. That station closed on the same day it launched. Operations at the network's headquarters in twofour54 media zone, Abu Dhabi, began in February 2012. It began broadcasting on 6 May 2012. On 8 November 2015, Sky News Arabia launched its own radio station at 90.3 FM, which was originally the home of BBC World Service in Arabic. It is a live-anchored all-news station offering general news, weather, sports, traffic, stock market updates and political discussion in randomized blocks. Specialized segments are created specifically for morning, early afternoon, and early evening hours. Several television programmes can also be heard as well.
Broadcasting
Sky News Arabia claims a commitment to independent reporting and avoiding partisan programming. A six-person editorial advisory committee exercises oversight over the network's editorial output. Sky News Arabia is broadcast to more than 50 million households in the MENA region on satellite and cable providers, as well as over the internet and mobile apps. It is available free-to-air on Nilesat 201, Arabsat, Hot Bird and Astra. It is available in the United States, Canada, South America, Australia and New Zealand through myTV's platform. It is also available to watch on Sky channel 788 in the United Kingdom and Ireland.
Facilities
Sky News Arabia's headquarters are located in Abu Dhabi's twofour54 media zone. The technical integration process at the studio was carried out from April 2011 to February 2012 in collaboration with Television Systems Limited. The facility consists of one large single studio which houses a number of permanent sets used for different programs. It also consists of a 10-meter wide video wall.
