History
Keshet was founded in 1993 when Israel's Channel 2 was formed along with two other operators, Telad and Reshet.[6] The company was started by Alex Gilady, the current president of Keshet[7] and a former vice president at NBC International in London.[8]
The first drama series Keshet produced was in 1996 called Bat Yam, New York. That same year, Channel 2 became the most watched channel in Israel.[9] What a Wonderful Country (Eretz Nehederet), a TV series similar to Saturday Night Live, aired its first season in 2003 and has since become one of the most popular shows on Israeli TV.[10][11]
In 2005, a committee formed by the Second Israeli Broadcasting Authority selected two of the three operators to run the next phase of Channel 2, one of only two channels allowed to run commercials. Keshet came first and was awarded four broadcasting days per week. The other two days were awarded to Reshet.[12] That same year, Keshet purchased the rights to Uvda, an investigative and current affairs program hosted by Ilana Dayan. The show was originally launched in 1993 and has been the only continuously running program since the launch of commercial television in Israel.[13][14]
In 2007, Keshet launched the Israeli version of Big Brother called HaAh HaGadol. It became the most-watched television show of the year and remains one of the highest-rated shows in Israel. In 2010, Keshet launched Prisoners of War (Hatufim), which was also sold to Showtime and developed into Homeland a year later with Keshet as an executive producer.[9][15]
Keshet also runs the Israeli Music 24, Netex New Media, a Hebrew-language website directory, and the comedy outlet Bip, all integrated under news and entertainment portal, mako.[16]
In 2012, Keshet Media Group Avi Nir launched and hosted the inaugural Innovation in Television (INTV) confab, a two-day conference in Jerusalem that has featured a stellar line up of the most prominent industry leaders, creators, executives and thinkers over the course of the six events to date.[17][18][19] The seventh edition is scheduled for March 2021.[20]
