Zee Networks chief executive officer Deepak Shourie told eFE that the company planned to go for distribution and content sharing tie-ups abroad to target Zee News at Indian diaspora. Shourie would soon be visiting several markets in the United States and Europe to explore possibilities for such alliances. Zee News is presently visible in parts of Europe, USA, Africa and the Caribbeans through news feeds carried out in Zee TV and Zee Gold, but not as a separate channel. The move is directed at positioning Zee News as an international channel, industry watchers said.

Shourie said that a spruced up news portal was expected to be launched next month. The interactive portal site will also enable streaming of digital media at a latter date, he added.

Earlier addressing mediapersons in the Capital, Shourie said the channel was expected to break even in the current fiscal 2000-2001 and earn profits.As reported by eFE earlier, the channel has set a target to be cash-flow positive by end of current fiscal.

To optimise resource utilisation within the Zee group, Zee News will also be handling news for its Alpha brand of regional channels which includes Punjabi, Gujarati, Bangla and Marathi, Shourie said. The channel is in the process of re-positioning itself, targeting the upscale audience and premium advertisers. The channel expects to earn 80 per cent of its revenue from prime time slot of 8 pm to 11 pm. A slew of new programmes, including more coverage to business news, is also in the pipeline.

The channel will spend up to Rs 10 crore this year on buying state-of-the-art equipment and upgrading itself technically. "Our objective is to make Zee News the most upscale news and information channel," Shourie said.

He added that the 24-hour Hindi news channel was looking at introducing English news programmes at a later date.In terms of reach, Shourie said Zee News was available in around 12 million households. Quoting the Indian Readership Survey 2000, the channel commanded 51 per cent as per Intam survey while its nearest competitor Star News was second with 38 per cent, with BBC lagging at five per cent and CNBC as well as CNN at a minuscule three per cent. Shourie said the thrust of the channel was on making programmes in-house and developing branded slots with new programming.