Inter: from Survival to Return to the “Big Game”

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The media group has serious plans: launching another in-house channel, investing between 5 and 7 million in its development, and creating its own content and news.

At the beginning of the year, Inter Media Group reported an increase in the performance of its channels: ‘Inter Media Group is the only Ukrainian media group that showed growth in 2024,’ the media group said in a release. The most notable successes are on the NTN channel, which is now the main channel of the group, as Inter is involved in the telethon. Inter Media Group does not yet have any special channels that duplicate the entertainment content of the main broadcasters (such as ICTV2 or 1+1 Ukraine). Therefore, according to the media group, in 2024, NTN was ahead of 1+1 Ukraine and moved up to the sixth position in terms of the audience aged 18-54.

These changes are not accidental, as the media group, after the appointment of the new management, has found money for its own production (such as TV series), for excluding its K2 and Zoom channels (which have been broadcasting the telethon since March 2022) from the marathon, and for launching a new broadcaster. With it, Inter, as promised by Supervisory Board member Serhiy Sozanovsky, who actually took over the media group in 2023, plans to return to the ‘big leagues’ this year.

The current state of the media group is different from the situation Inter found itself in at the beginning of the full-scale war. Back then, the channel was controlled by one of its owners, Serhiy Lyovochkin, a member of the OPFL parliamentary faction. The majority owner, Dmytro Firtash, has been under NSDC sanctions since 2021, and the media group might not have survived the first year of the war. After all, the president was bold enough to impose sanctions on pro-Russian channels from Medvedchuk's orbit and Nash. However, Inter survived even when Rinat Akhmetov closed his media group. This is despite the fact that Firtash, like Akhmetov, lost some of his assets in Ukraine, including regional gas companies and enterprises in the Luhansk region and the Siverskodonetsk-based Azot. In May 2022, the State Bureau of Investigation transferred 26 regional gas distribution system operators of the Regional Gas Company group, owned by Firtash, to the Asset Recovery and Management Agency.

February 2022 brought Inter to the brink of survival, with operations at the channels almost paralysed. The management of the media group and part of the management of the National Information Systems (NIS) production company, which produces news for Inter, along with the CFO and chief accountant, did not come to work. Some journalists and presenters have left for Western regions or other countries. According to Forbes Ukraine, only thirty of the two hundred people who used to make news on Inter were at work. But the channel joined the United News marathon.

According to Detector Media, the process was then coordinated by NIS general producer Nazim Bedirov, who negotiated with journalists to resume work and with the authorities to join the production of the marathon. This guaranteed money, as the production of the marathon has been funded by the state since 2022. Accordingly, the main efforts were directed only at it, and those involved in the marathon received salaries. From its own sources, DM learned that other employees of the group were sent on unpaid leave. ‘Inter also refused to lease some of its buildings, keeping only the office at 30 Dmytrivska Street, where employees who used to work at 26 Bulvarno-Kudryavska Street and Shchuseva Street, where NIS production is located, moved.

The media group had eight digital channels (Inter, K2 and Zoom broadcast the marathon, while NTN, Enter Film, Pixel, K1 and Mega broadcast their own content). Broadcasting a channel on the T2 network costs about a million hryvnias, which means 8 million per month for Inter. There were no funds for this, and debts to Zeonbud were incurred.

Forbes Ukraine reported on the possible sale of Inter Group in 2022. But if anyone had such thoughts, it was obviously unrealistic to find a buyer for such an asset in the first year of the great war.

In 2023, quite controversial events began at Inter. In May 2023, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) announced that Dmytro Firtash and his top managers were suspected of misappropriating state gas worth UAH 18 billion. In August of the same year, Firtash's assets worth UAH 7.4 billion were seized in Ukraine in connection with the case. However, the media group continued to receive money from the state for the production of the marathon, and a few months after the announcement of the suspicion, Dmytro Firtash even increased his stake in Inter, which probably also happened with the consent of the authorities: in July 2023, he bought a stake in the channel from Serhiy Lyovochkin and increased his share in Inter from 53.4% to 59.5%.

According to sources, the media group was taken over by new management in the summer, headed by Film.ua owner Serhiy Sozanovsky. However, the change of management and the departure of Hanna Bezlyudna, who had been head of Inter's board since 2013, were officially announced only in November 2023.

Serhiy Sozanovsky and his partner in other businesses and the law firm of the same name, Serhiy Kononov, joined the Supervisory Board. Oleksandr Pylypets, who was editor-in-chief of the TV channel during Bezlyudna's era and has been the head of NIS LLC for almost a decade, was appointed as the new chairman of Inter's board. After the invasion, he went to serve in the Armed Forces but later returned to the channel. According to DM's sources, Oleksandr Pylypets had a conflict with Nazim Bedirov. Therefore, Bedirov did not remain in the new team.

Yuliya Lytvynenko became the director of NIS, while Oleksandr Omelyanchyk and Viktoria Naidyonova remained executive producer and editor-in-chief, respectively.

This is the third time Serhiy Sozanovsky has returned to Inter. From 1997 to 2005, he was a member of Inter's management board, and from 2006 to 2010, he was its chairman.

In a blitz interview with Forbes Ukraine, Sozanovsky said that at the time of his third arrival at the media group, Inter was ‘not taken seriously in the professional environment, in the advertising environment’, ‘it does not produce anything, it does not buy anything’. In fact, the media group existed on state funds from the marathon.

‘I definitely can't promise any bright sparks in the state of Inter in which it is now. It will be quite difficult. There are some common industry secrets that will help improve the situation somewhat and prevent the group from running aground or crashing into rocks. This is a minimum programme,’ Sozanovsky said.

The new management of the media group immediately turned their attention to the so-called foreign corps. The fact is that in the spring of 2022, part of the group's team was taken to Poland, where it produced a block for the Russian-language marathon of foreign broadcasting FreeDom, projects for the NTN channel, and more. The new management, according to DM's sources, announced that due to a lack of resources, it would stop funding the team that worked from Warsaw. According to DM, some of the staff from this group decided not to return to Ukraine and not to continue working with Inter. Among them, our sources named, in particular, the editor-in-chief of Inter TV channel Anton Nikitin and TV presenter Andriy Danylevych. Andriy Danylevych said that he left Inter because the new management was not interested in continuing his project ‘It concerns everyone’.

According to DM's sources, layoffs were also planned at NIS, but the production company's management managed to defend its people. Only the regional offices and part of the regional NTN team were cut. Some top managers of the previous team were also fired.

Sozanovsky did not promise ‘bright sparks’, but the media group's channels received funds for their own production and a piece of the advertising pie. Currently, Inter jointly sells advertising with StarLightMedia and 1+1 Media. According to DM's sources, its share is about 10%. Last year, the channel's advertising revenues tripled.

In the autumn season, the current flagship of Inter Group, NTN channel, aired its first two series. The first was a 60-episode film, Drone (co-produced with Kyivtelefilm), about the work of investigators and a German shepherd dog named Drone. In the middle of autumn, the TV series Border Guards (co-produced by Inter Media Group and Dali Bude Films LLC) about Ukrainian cadets was released. The channel also launched new episodes of ‘Rechdok’. K1 added new travel shows to its airwaves and focused on this content, while Mega purchased foreign content.

At the end of the year, NTN was ahead of 1+1 Ukraine, and K1, according to the press service, increased its performance by 60% - from 0.65% to 1.04% of the 18-54 audience share. Back in 2024, the group withdrew K2 from the marathon and relaunched it with an updated grid.

Inter Group also entered the pay-TV market. Denys Vasyanovych, Head of Distribution at Inter Media Group, said that in addition to its own channels, Inter Media Group's distribution package includes Rybalka TV, Now series, Fashion TV, Fashion TV UA, and Inraiting.

To cooperate with OTT services, the group launched and registered its FAST channels (Gazda, Cooking Together, It Concerns Everyone, Rechdok, OiR), which have good viewership. According to Detector Media, for 2025, 1+1 Group, in addition to the package of its own and partner channels, offered OTT services 15 thematic channels from 1+1 Media, Inter Media Group and Film.ua. “Plusy” (1+1 Media) is a long-standing distribution partner of Film.ua channels, so it is logical that under Sozanovsky, they were joined by Inter broadcasters.

Inter started the new 2025 year with the relaunch of the Zoom channel, which was removed from the marathon and has had its own grid since 1 January. The channel has changed its format from entertainment to general interest and is now broadcasting ‘Rechdok’, ‘Legends of Criminal Investigation’, etc.

But this is only the beginning of the plans. The channel plans to return to the big game in the autumn season of 2025. The media group has already obtained a new digital licence from MX-7 for Inter Ukraine for this very purpose. Inter Ukraine was represented by Supervisory Board member Serhiy Sozanovsky and Inter CEO Oleksandr Pylypets. They positioned the channel as a channel with news, analytical programmes, documentaries, TV series and movies.

‘Inter is returning to the big game. That's the whole concept of the channel. Because our competitors have relaxed. We will give more life and fire,’ said Sozanovsky. He named 1+1 and SLM as the main competitors.

During the presentation, it was emphasised that the channel would be all about news. As a reminder, since the United News marathon began, its producers have not broadcast news on their national channels.

"I have been involved in news all my life. It is time to be responsible news. I agree that journalism is limping now. We need to restore journalism, which existed in good times with social responsibility. After the victory, we will need to return to normal life. And the entire channel must become socially responsible. We must unite society and move towards a greater Ukraine," said Oleksandr Pylypets.

Serhiy Sozanovsky added that Inter will participate in producing the marathon as long as United News exists. He said that according to agreements between media groups, there will be no separate news on the channels during the marathon broadcast: "We are corporately solidary. There is an agreement that is wrong to violate."

Perhaps Serhiy Sozanovsky is counting on the war, along with the marathon, to end by the autumn television season. And then, as Oleksandr Pylypets, who was in charge of news on Inter when the channel was the mouthpiece of the OPFL parliamentary faction, said, the time will come to "restore journalism, which existed in good times with social responsibility." DM sources in the media group's staff also talk about the expectation of an early end to the marathon so that "the channel can get back on its feet."

But at the beginning, the new channel Inter Ukraine plans to go on the air not with library content but with new projects, the creation of which takes time. "To implement the tasks and return to the big game, we plan to launch in the autumn of 2025. If we manage to do it earlier, it will be cool. But it all depends on the situation on the advertising market, the situation in Ukraine, the situation with producers," said Sozanovsky.

The group plans to invest up to $7 million in the new channel. “In order to compete with the top players, $5-7 million needs to be invested in the new channel,” Sozanovsky said in a comment to Forbes Ukraine. Whether this will be their own funds or borrowed funds is still being decided.

But in any case, it is obvious that a media group with a sanctioned owner exists with the permission of the authorities and with full loyalty to the authorities on the part of the group leader. Serhiy Sozanovsky is exactly such a person.

The current government attaches great importance to media projects and diversifies them. Thus, while developing the state-owned media ("Dim", "FreeDom", "Armia TV", "Rada"), the President's Office is also investing in other assets. The group My-Ukraine, which already has two channels and a radio station with a frequency in Kyiv, is associated with the head of OP, Andriy Yermak. The nationwide channel of Taras Shkiter from the political party Svydomi, K Konkurent, which received a digital license in the Zeonbud multiplex in July 2024 (this channel is associated with the radio Champion, which received a frequency in Kyiv this year), is also called a project of the government team. After the arrest of Ihor Kolomoisky, the 1+1 group cannot but be under the control of the government.

It is logical to assume that all these resources are being accumulated for the upcoming elections, which the current government is not going to lose. Despite the nominal transparency of Inter's ownership (which still belongs to the sanctioned Firtash), society, as in the case of My-Ukraina, knows nothing about the investor of one of the largest media groups, his interests, or his motives for investing in a loss-making business.

ADDED:

After the article was published, the 1+1 press service pointed out that by the end of 2024, NTN was ahead of 1+1 Ukraine only in terms of weekday viewing. Instead, 1+1 Ukraine, with a share of 3.66%, is ahead of NTN, with a share of 3.6% in the ‘commercial day’.

The astronomical television day lasts from 03:00 to 03:00 (27:00), and the commercial day lasts from 06:00 to 02:00 (26:00), as TV channels compete with each other only in the rating slots with advertising, mostly neglecting the night slots.