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MBC Group

Media & Advertising

MBC Group Overview

Founded in London in 1991 as the Middle East Broadcasting Centre, MBC Group is one of the biggest media conglomerates in the Middle East.

In 2002, it relocated its headquarters to Dubai and then in 2022 it moved to Riyadh.

It is majority owned by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund and traded o the Tadawul.

MBC runs more than 19 free-to-air satellite TV stations and the Shahid video-on-demand service.

With broadcasts via the Eutelsat, Arabsat and Nilesat satellites, its main channel MBC 1 was the first in the Arab world to offer 24-hour satellite-based free-to-air programming.

MBC Group also ventured into HD channels in 2011 and it partnered with Snapchat Discover in 2017.

In 2023, 60 percent of MBC Group was held by Saudi Ministry of Finance subsidiary Istedamah Holding Company and 40 percent by founder Waleed bin Ibrahim Al Ibrahim.

Then in the same year it listed 10% of its share capital in an IPO. By late 2024, Istedamah’s stake reduced to 54%, later transferred to the Public Investment Fund.

With more than 165 million viewers as of 2011, MBC Group plans to expand with initiatives including the premium production company MBC Studios and the MBC Academy.

MBC Group News

MBC is one of the largest media and entertainment companies in the Mena region, operating 13 free-to-air television channels

PIF to acquire 54% stake in MBC Group for $2bn

Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) has agreed to acquire a 54 percent stake in MBC Group for SAR7.5 billion ($2 billion). The fund will buy Istedamah Holding Company’s entire stake through a private transaction priced at SAR41.60 per share, MBC Group said in a statement to the Saudi stock exchange on Sunday. The transaction […]

An investor at the Dubai International Financial Market. The share prices of four of the 20 Gulf companies that listed since early 2023 have at least doubled

Stock prices of Gulf companies surge after IPOs

Most Gulf companies that completed initial public offerings (IPOs) recently have seen their market capitalisation soar, with issuers pricing flotations adroitly to bolster investor demand for their stocks after listing. From the start of 2023 there have been 20 Gulf IPOs that raised at least $100 million. Combined, these sold $11.2 billion of shares. As […]

Waleed bin Ibrahim Al Ibrahim, CEO of MBC Group, which raised $222 million with its IPO

Saudi Arabia dominates Mena Q1 public listings

Saudi Arabia dominated public listings in the region in the first quarter of the year and maintains a “healthy pipeline” of IPOs for the remainder of 2024. Nine companies were brought to market in Saudi Arabia during the opening three months, according to the latest report from global consultants EY. The kingdom’s largest, and the […]

Tawfik Alzaidi

Saudi director’s labour of love takes the kingdom to Cannes

For the first time a Saudi film has been selected to compete in the Cannes film festival, catapulting its little-known self-taught director into the limelight. Tawfik Alzaidi was so surprised that he’d managed to break through to the big time that he kept the news that his film Norah had been accepted for the ‘Un […]

MBC Shahid Ashghal Shaqa

Streaming platform Shahid to drive growth, says MBC TV

The Arabic TV network MBC says its new Shahid streaming platform will lead its growth after subscriptions grew 40 percent in 2023 to nearly four million.  The Saudi-owned group recently completed an IPO on the Saudi stock exchange, requiring it to open its books to the public for the first time.  It reported net profit […]

Elie Habib, co-founder of streaming service Anghami

MBC Group buys stake in Anghami

Shares of the Abu-Dhabi-based music streaming company Anghami rose by more than 80 percent this week after the release of a regulatory filing revealed that Saudi media company MBC Group has acquired a 14 percent stake. MBC Group, through its arm MBC Ventures, purchased four million ordinary shares of the Nasdaq-listed company. The purchase was […]

People speak in the lobby of the Dubai Financial Market. Strict IPO rules mean loss-making startups cannot go public

Tough IPO rules deter UAE tech startups from listing

The UAE’s burgeoning startup sector has helped it become a centre for tech innovation, yet almost none of these fledgling companies have gone public due to stock market regulations. Since 2021 the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) and Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange (ADX) have welcomed a flurry of initial public offerings as part-privatised government-related companies diversify […]

People are still watching full-size TVs rather than streaming programmes on their phone

Saudi TV fights off the smartphone challenge

Smart television is holding up as the main platform for accessing sports, news and entertainment in Saudi Arabia, despite the boom in streaming services that can be watched on smartphones, a leading media researcher said this week.   “In the past decade there was a lot of transformation in Saudi. New devices, behaviours and trends,” said […]

Filming for MBC drama 'Umm Haroun'. The Saudi media group offered a 10% stake in its IPO

Shares in MBC rise 30% on Saudi Tadawul debut

The share price of media company MBC Group rose by 30 percent as it made its debut on the Saudi stock exchange on Monday. The Saudi group’s initial public offering of a 10 percent stake last month was 17.6 times oversubscribed by retail investors, raising SAR1.46 billion ($390 million). At the opening bell of the […]