TV5/History

TV5 or simply known as 5 is a Philippine free-to-air television and radio network based in Mandaluyong City, with its alternate studios, the analog and digital transmitter is located at Novaliches, Quezon City. It is the flagship property of TV5 Network, Inc. with Cignal TV as its main content provider, both owned by MediaQuest Holdings.

The network was formerly known as ABC (Associated Broadcasting Corporation from 1960 until its closure in 1972, and Associated Broadcasting Company from its revival in 1992 until 2008), and as The 5 Network from 2018 until 2020. TV5 is also informally referred to as The Kapatid Network (A Filipino term for sibling); this name was introduced in 2010.

The early years (1960–1972)
Joaquin "Chino" Roces, owner of the Manila Times was granted of a radio-TV franchise from Congress under Republic Act 2945 on 19 June 1960. He then founded the Associated Broadcasting Corporation with its first studios along Pasong Tamo, becoming the fourth television network established in the country. ABC operated radio and television services from 1960 until 23 September 1972 when President Ferdinand E. Marcos declared Martial Law. Both ABC and the Manila Times were forcibly shut down as a result with rivals ABS-CBN, RBS, MBC and RMN–IBC's radio and television broadcasts also shut down by martial law that day.

After the People Power Revolution in 1986, Chino Roces made a successful representation with President Corazon Cojuangco-Aquino for the network's reinstatement. ABC's rival ABS-CBN reopened that year but ABC was not yet reopened until it made a test broadcast in 1991 and finally reopened in 1992. Chino Roces died in 1988, but his son Edgardo Roces would reopen the network after.

New stockholders led by broadcast veteran Edward Tan and Chino Roces's son Edgardo then began the arduous task of resuming broadcasts. The Securities and Exchange Commission granted their application for an increase in capitalization and amendments to ABC's articles of incorporation and by-laws. They were subsequently granted a permit to operate by the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC).

The return and growth (1992–2003)
ABC inaugurated its studio complex and transmitter tower in San Bartolome, Novaliches, Quezon City in 1990 and began test broadcasts by the end of 1991; officially and finally returning to the air as the Associated Broadcasting Company on 21 February 1992 with the different callsign of the flagship station, DWET-TV and the corporate name, Associated Broadcasting Company, which the Company uses C as the corporate initial instead of keeping Corporation, the name of the original ABC, along its original callsign, DZTM-TV, during the pre-martial law years as a result of the new management of the now revived network which took over its operations.

ABC acquired a new 25-year franchise to operate on 9 December 1994 under Republic Act 7831 signed by President Fidel Valdez Ramos. In the same year, it went on nationwide satellite broadcasting. In a surge of phenomenal growth, ABC earned its reputation as "The Fastest Growing Network" under new network executive Tina Monzon-Palma who served as Chief Operating Officer.

In 2001, ABC began to produce local versions of The Price Is Right (hosted by Dawn Zulueta and later acquired by ABS-CBN); Wheel of Fortune (hosted by Rustom Padilla, later acquired by ABS-CBN); and Family Feud (hosted by Ogie Alcasid, later acquired by GMA Network and then by ABS-CBN). This was during the height of the game show frenzy within Philippine networks brought on by the success of IBC's Philippine editions of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? (hosted by Christopher de Leon, which is later transferred to TV5 hosted by Vic Sotto) and The Weakest Link (hosted by Edu Manzano).

The Cojuangco era (2003–2008)
In June 2003, The Tan-Roces joint consortium sold ABC TV and radio stations to the group led by businessman Antonio "Tonyboy" O. Cojuangco, Jr. former Chairman of the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT) and owner of Dream Satellite TV and Bank of Commerce, among other assets it later formally acquired in October of the same year. Cojuangco was the president and CEO of ABC, while Jose T. Pardo, a former secretary of the Department of Trade and Industry also was the network's board chairman at the time. The new management introduced many changes including a stronger news and public affairs division, modernization of its broadcast equipment, and the acquisition of broadcast rights of Philippine Basketball Association games. Additionally, the network also launched a new advertising campaign and slogan, "Iba Tayo!" ("We're Different!"), which emphasized the new lineup as being more distinct and new than what was being aired by its competitors at the time, targeting the burgeoning middle- to upper-class youth market. ABC continued to support Family Rosary Crusade, and its religious pre-identification campaign "Please Pray the Rosary" was played before every program on the network until the plug gradually phased out due to the network's programming revamp.

In 2005, ABC won the "Outstanding TV Station" award at the 2005 KBP Golden Dove Awards, with several other programs on the network also earning awards in their respective categories.

In early 2007, ABC implemented a series of budget cuts, primarily directed towards its news department, which laid off most of its employees. The cuts, held prior to the 2007 general elections, left ABC almost incapable of coverage.

In November 2007, ABC debuted an array of new sports programming, including NBA basketball, pro boxing, and WWE events, as part of a new five-year deal with Solar Entertainment. However, due to their high costs and poor ratings, these programs were later dropped throughout 2008, and its NBA review show "House of Hoops" was cut back as well and eventually cancelled by April 2008. However, much of these programs, along with the PBA (as ABC elected not to renew its contract that ended after the 2008 Fiesta Conference), would be picked up by RPN, who had begun a much wider partnership with Solar earlier in 2007, which led to its privatization by the latter in 2011.

ABC-MPB Primedia partnership (2008–2010)
In March 2008, Cojuangco announced that ABC had reached a partnership with MPB Primedia Inc., a local company backed by Media Prima Berhad of Malaysia as part of a long-term strategy to make the network more competitive. MPB Primedia, meanwhile, was formed to serve as seed asset for Media Prima's proposed private equity fund to invest in various media companies within Southeast Asia. Cojuangco said MPB Primedia Inc., in principle, would produce and source most of the entertainment programs while ABC would continue to be responsible for news programming and operation of the stations. MPB Primedia was also given exclusive right to schedule and manage sale of ABC-5's airtime. Christopher Sy was named CEO of MPB Primedia, Inc.; he served in that capacity until his resignation in January 2009 due to reported differences in management style.

ABC signed off for the last time at around 22:00 PHT on 8 August 2008 with its late night newscast Sentro as the last program on air, and then aired a countdown to its re-launch for much of the next day until 19:00 PHT, when the network officially re-launched under its new name of TV5. Its programming lineup aims towards "progressive Pinoys including those young at heart" (market classes C and D), and unveiled its newly upgraded 120-kilowatt state-of-the-art stereo TV transmitter. Shall We Dance, some shows in Nick on TV5, Kerygma TV, Light Talk, and Sunday TV Mass were the only ABC programs that were carried over to the line-up of TV5.

In December 2008, a lawsuit was filed by GMA Network, Inc., Citynet Television and ZOE Broadcasting Network against ABC, MPB, and MPB Primedia, alleging that TV5's lease of airtime to Media Prima was intended to circumvent regulations restricting foreign ownership of broadcasting companies. In response, ABC's media relations head Pat Marcelo-Magbanua reiterated that the network was a Filipino company that was self-registered and Filipino-run.

Despite the lawsuit, the network's ratings were revitalized by the new management, as its audience share increased from 1.9% in July 2008 (prior to the re-branding) to 11.1% in September 2009.

Acquisition by PLDT, the Kapatid Network years (2010–2018)
On 20 October 2009, Media Prima announced that it would be divesting its share in MPB Primedia / TV5, along with its affiliate ABC TV stations, and selling it to the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company's broadcasting division, MediaQuest Holdings as it contributes to the company's losses during the year. The acquisition was officially announced by Chairman Manuel V. Pangilinan on 2 March 2010, along with the announcement of a new lineup of programming to debut on the network, along with a new campaign branding itself as the "Kapatid" ("sibling") network, in par with its rivals ABS-CBN and GMA Network. Dream FM and its affiliate stations in other parts of the country were not part of the acquisition and remained under the Cojuangco management led by former ABC stockholder Anton Lagdameo; which then acquired a non-controlling share on Interactive Broadcast Media (IBMI), to continue the operation of the stations, which became collectively known as the Dream FM Network, with IBMI as its licensee until its closure in June 2011, with the airtime of its flagship Manila station being sold to Ultrasonic Broadcasting System and relaunched as Energy FM.

On 1 October 2010, TV5 took over the management of MediaQuest's Nation Broadcasting Corporation stations; DWFM was re-launched as a TV5-branded news radio station on 8 November 2010, Radyo5 92.3 News FM, and DWNB-TV was re-launched as AksyonTV on 21 February 2011, a news channel based on TV5's newscast Aksyon. At its peak, while retaining current position, TV5 was able to outrank GMA Network and become second most-watched network in key cities in Visayas and Mindanao, including Iloilo, Cebu, Bacolod, Davao, Cagayan de Oro; and even shared the top spot with ABS-CBN in General Santos City.

On 23 December 2013, the network began broadcasting from its new headquarters, the 6,000-square meter TV5 Media Center located in Reliance, Mandaluyong.

In 2014, ABC Development Corporation acquired Filipino broadcast rights to the 2014 Winter Olympics, 2014 Summer Youth Olympics and the 2016 Summer Olympics.

Despite financial struggles within the management, TV5 continued to be on top as one of the top three television networks in the country with male and younger viewers dominated the audience reach due to the network's broadcast of the Philippine Basketball Association via Sports5 and the strengthened TV5 Kids block, which included the Marvel Studios animation programs in October 2014. The network celebrated its fifth anniversary under the management of Manny V. Pangilinan coinciding with its trade launch of 2015 shows held at the Sofitel Philippine Plaza on 26 November 2014.

The network opened the year 2015 with the grand New Year's Eve countdown dubbed as Happy sa 2015 at the Quezon City Memorial Circle.

In 2015, the network changed its corporate name from ABC Development Corporation to TV5 Network Inc.

However, by that point, the network incurred increasing losses and debts brought about by few advertisers (e.g. Unilever) as well as digitalization. This forced the network to implement a series of retrenchment of its employees. The biggest retrenchment happened in September 2015, when TV5's in-house entertainment division got on the verge of dissolution and initiated layoffs, including Wilma Galvante, its Chief Entertainment Content Officer. From 4,000 employees in mid-2013, the series of retrenchment resized TV5 to merely around 700 employees by the end of 2017.

Incapable of producing original content, TV5 appointed Viva Entertainment CEO, Vicente "Vic" Del Rosario as the network's new Chief Entertainment Strategist, implementing changes on TV5's entertainment programming. These included a formation of the Viva-TV5 joint venture Sari-Sari Channel and outsourcing Viva Television for its entertainment shows, including a revival of Ang Panday, the return of Diether Ocampo and Claudine Barretto's tandem in Bakit Manipis ang Ulap? and shows from by-then sister station MTV Pinoy such as Top 20 Pilipinas. New shows started to air between November 2015 and February 2016 but were cancelled a few months later due to lack of advertisement support and poor ratings.

Since January 2016, TV5 and Cignal via Hyper was the official Free TV and Pay TV partner, respectively, of the Ultimate Fighting Championship in the Philippines, this lasted until December 31, 2018.

By July 2016, TV5 began airing selected programs from MTV and MTV International like Catfish, Ridiculousness and Ex on the Beach after inking a deal with Viacom International Media Networks that month to create the new MTV on TV5 block.

On 8 September 2016, TV5 cancelled its locally produced programs Aksyon Bisaya (Cebu) and Aksyon Dabaw (Davao) due to cost-cutting measures. However, the personnel remained employed as they will continue filing reports for the national edition of Aksyon.

On 30 September 2016, TV5 President and CEO Emmanuel "Noel" C. Lorenzana stepped down from his position. He was replaced by basketball coach and Sports5/D5 Studio head, Vicente "Chot" Reyes the following day. Following his appointment, the network announced it would be retrenching around 200 employees as part of TV5's digitalization.

In April 2017, TV5 acquired the rights to air the WWE after Fox Philippines decision to not renew its contract with the WWE due to unknown reasons. The network previously handle the rights from 2007 to 2008 and 2010.

On 12 October 2017, TV5 Network announced its partnership with ESPN, licensing its PBA, UFC, PSL and NFL rights and giving TV5 access to ESPN programs and content. The partnership formed the ESPN5 brand, airing on TV5 and AksyonTV. The said deal comes in response to the network's formal, albeit temporary shift from a general entertainment station to a sports and news channel.

The 5 Network era and reverting back as TV5 (2018–2020)
On 17 February 2018, in line with the recent changes within the network and in celebration of its 10th anniversary, TV5 was relaunched as The 5 Network or simply 5 with a new logo and station ID entitled Get It on 5, whereas the word TV on the top right quadrant of the logo was dropped, making it more flexible for the other divisions to use it as part of their own identity. Aside from rebranding, TV5's programming grid was divided into three blocks: ESPN5 (Sports), News 5, and On 5 (Entertainment, Anime, Cartoons, Informative and Home TV Shopping), along with D5 Studio (Digital Content) and Studio 5 (World-class Filipino productions for audiences across all platforms). Along with the rebrand, the Kapatid moniker was also de-emphasized and is now only used by News5 and ESPN5 for some of its programs. But the more visible change was the gradual phaseout of Filipino-dubbed movies and foreign-acquired programming, a practice that dated back from the operations under the MPB Primedia era in 2008. At present, even its Disney Club on 5 programs and its movies aired in the English language.

On 13 January 2019, coinciding with the reformat of AksyonTV to 5 Plus, 5 introduced a variation of its 2018 logo. It also included the websites of the division producing the program airing (e.g. TV5.com.ph for entertainment and blocktimers) as part of their on-screen graphics.

On 22 April 2019, TV5 Network was granted a 25-year legislative franchise extension under Republic Act 11320 albeit without President Rodrigo Roa Duterte's signature as the bill lapsed into law after 30 days of inaction. On 3 June 2019, Chot Reyes retired as TV5 President and CEO. He was immediately replaced by Jane Basas, who also leads pay-TV provider and radio company Cignal TV/Mediascape. Upon her appointment, the network began to outsource news and sports programming from its co-owned Cignal channels One News, One PH, One Sports, and PBA Rush; it also phased out its daytime ESPN5 programs and relegated it to sister free-TV station 5 Plus in favor of archived entertainment programs and expanded movie blocks. Jane Basas later revealed future plans for the network; that included retaining its existing news programs and sports content in primetime, and reintroducing original entertainment programming through outsourcing from Cignal Entertainment and other major blocktimers. The network also saw the return of former TV5 executive Perci Intalan as the station's head of programming in November.

On 4 February 2020, Robert P. Galang was appointed as the new president and CEO of TV5 Network and Cignal TV, replacing Basas who in turn, was appointed as the new Chief Marketing Officer of Smart Communications.

On 8 March 2020, 5's sister channel 5 Plus was relaunched as One Sports (moving from being a Cignal-exclusive pay television channel), with the ESPN5 division also being renamed and merged to the abovementioned brand. As a result, all sports programming on 5 no longer carried the ESPN5 banner. Despite the change, the ESPN5 partnership continues online, with ESPN5.com serving as the de facto sports portal of both One Sports and ESPN in the Philippines. On the same day, TV5 Network announced that 5 would be rebranded as One TV (adopting from Cignal TV's "One"-branded channels), which was originally scheduled on 13 April 2020. However, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic (and the implementation of the enhanced community quarantine), the network postponed it. In June 2020 (after Metro Manila was placed in general community quarantine), the network announced that the rebrand would be pushed through on 20 July, but on July 4, the network officially cancelled the change due to netizens' adverse reaction to the upcoming rebrand as well as the opinions of the network's loyal viewers and fans. Viewers complained that it would have confused them and potentially diminished viewership. Due to this, the plugs of One TV (both on-air and online) were later pulled out of circulation. On 20 July 2020, 5 brings out new Tagalog-dubbed series and more entertainment content on primetime then later it announced that 5 will be reverted as TV5.

On 27 July 2020, Cignal TV, TV5 and their sister company, Smart Communications announced its multi-year deal with the National Basketball Association for the league's official broadcast rights in the Philippines, replacing Solar Entertainment Corporation. The games during the 2019–20 season will be aired live on free-to-air networks TV5 and sister channel One Sports (replacing CNN Philippines as an exclusive but temporary free-to-air broadcaster, which eventually dropped in March because of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States and Canada, as well as the 4 month suspension of league play). This is the first time the NBA broadcasts on TV5 since the then-ABC 5 last aired the NBA games (in partnership with Solar Entertainment Corporation) from 2007 to 2008.

Second TV5 era and collaboration with Cignal TV (2020–present)
On 15 August 2020, 5 reverted to its former name, TV5 (while retaining the variation of its current numerical logo that was introduced in January 2019), as the network announced its partnership with sister company, Cignal TV as TV5's main content provider to handle its programming in order to bring back the glory days of TV5 to compete again with its rival TV network, GMA Network and other TV networks in the Philippines. On the same day, TV5 unveiled its first wave of entertainment programs produced by blocktimers, among them Archangel Media, ContentCows Company, Inc., Luminus Productions, Inc. (and later Viva Television and Brightlight Productions), which were part of the supposed lineup for now-cancelled rebranding of TV5 as One TV. In addition, shows from the foreclosed ABS-CBN were announced to be transferred to TV5 as the former implemented retrenchments following the non-renewal of its broadcast franchise. Currently, TV5 is in talks with the same network for the possibility to hire the displaced employees of its former rival with TV5 chairman Manuel V. Pangilinan stating that they are open to work with them. In mid-September 2020, TV5 unveils second wave of new programming line-up for October (including programs that produced by its blocktimers Viva and Brightlight, and News5 produced shows).

Blocktime with ABS-CBN, relaunch
Since January 2021, TV5 carried selected programming produced by its former rival ABS-CBN to expand its nationwide reach following the shutdown of its free-to-air network on 5 May 2020 (host broadcasters Kapamilya Channel, Kapamilya Online Live and A2Z Channel 11 (blocktime with ZOE Broadcasting Network) only provides limited coverage for cable/satellite TV, Facebook and YouTube livestream and FTA Mega Manila viewers, respectively). On 24 January, the Kapatid network began to simulcast ASAP Natin 'To and the FPJ: Da King movie block as part of an agreement with ABS-CBN, Cignal TV and Brightlight Productions (which formerly leased the airtime now occupied by the two aforementioned shows).

After the successful simulcast of both ASAP and the FPJ: Da King, on 5 March 2021, both TV5/Cignal and ABS-CBN announced that some primetime programs of ABS-CBN (including Ang sa Iyo ay Akin, FPJ's Ang Probinsyano, Walang Hanggang Paalam and Pinoy Big Brother: Connect) will be simulcast on TV5 starting 8 March. Coinciding with the announcement, the network unveiled its revamped programming under its new slogan TV5 TodoMax, wherein all programs are divided into five blocks: TodoMax Kids (cartoons and kids-oriented programming), TodoMax Serbisyo (Idol in Action), TodoMax Panalo (afternoon programming lineup), TodoMax Primetime Singko (news, game shows, dramas (original and Filipino-dubbed), PBA live game broadcast and ABS-CBN-produced shows) and TodoMax Weekend (Saturday and Sunday programming lineup).

A few months later, after the network's programming revamp, according to the AGB-Nielsen survey, TV5 became number 2 most-watched TV network in primetime TV ratings due to a stronger ABS-CBN Entertainment primetime programs as well as the strengthened Cignal Entertainment primetime programs on the network.

On 20 May 2021, TV5 relaunched its new slogan Iba sa 5 (It's different on 5) with a new station jingle composed by Jeff Arcilla, and new station ID. At that time, the network's 2019 logo was changed into the new full colored red scheme, which is similar to the current Cignal 2013 logo. At that time, the network's 2019 logo was changed into the new full colored darker red scheme, which is similar to the current Cignal 2013 logo.