SABC3 rebrands as S3 as it targets Netflix's millennial viewers

• SABC3 has a new name; from April, it will be known as S3.
• The TV channel is now targeting "progressive millennial" viewers who have abandoned traditional linear television.
• "We are creating a new SABC3, and we are taking note of industry trends," said Merlin Naicker, the SABC's head of TV.

The South African public broadcaster's SABC3 has undergone another image rebranding exercise with the TV channel that will now be known as simply "S3" from April, with a lime green-on-blue logo together with the new slogan "Open Up".

S3, as the SABC's only commercial TV channel, is now targeting "progressive millennial" viewers who have abandoned traditional linear television and switched to streaming services like Netflix, with the SABC trying to lure some of that audience to linear TV through compelling content and conversations.

SABC3's switch to S3 is part of a content offering rebuilding, and market repositioning for the financially struggling channel that has seen its fortunes, allure as a viewership destination, and its ratings wane over the past decade.

Under new channel head Pat van Heerden, SABC3 is rebuilding and re-emerging as S3, slowly adding edgy and provocative content, and looking to re-engage viewers, especially a younger-skewing audience, with more risqué programming stimulating conversation, debate and thought.

SABC3 is launching a new locally-produced telenovela by Clive Morris Productions from Monday 5 April at 19:00, The Estate to anchor its new prime-time lineup.

It's adding acclaimed foreign telenovelas like Brazil's refugee drama, Orphans of a Nation from Mondays to Wednesdays at 18:30, and Turkey's therapy clinic-set The Red Room on Thursdays and Fridays serving as the lead-in programming.

Unpacked with Relebogile Mabotja is a new local talk show for the S3 schedule that will kick off in April, promising to delve deep into topics and conversations that are deliberately chosen because they make people "uncomfortable".

The S3 talk show will tackle with sensitivity often-taboo subjects that South Africans are either too scared or too awkward about to address or simply don't know how to talk about publicly.

SABC3 unveiled its new S3 rebranding on Wednesday night at a media event held in Johannesburg.

Merlin Naicker, the SABC's head of TV, said: "We are creating a new SABC3 and we are taking note of industry trends and taking the schedules of SABC1 and SABC2 into consideration – the idea is to make sure that our audience will always find something that they will enjoy or that they can relate to on the SABC's channels."

Pat van Heerden said: "We're in a very congested television landscape and most of the channels that are coming in are international, and when we look at that, people are reduced to an algorithm. We have the opportunity as the SABC to speak to the citizens of our country.

"We have the privilege of creating a channel which our citizens can be connected to – and that's the privilege we have: connection. When you look at international channels like Netflix, they don't have that connection – that ability to speak to our audiences, to get reflections back."

A progressive millenial channel

"We're creating a channel in which our citizens belong, we have a conversation with them – and then we thought what else is out there in terms of SABC1 and SABC2? What can S3 offer?

"We're looking at becoming a progressive millennial channel in which we're speaking to the generation that has to face the future, that has to work in this economy, and we thought how can we become part of the conversation in terms of becoming future-fit – and that's what we're doing.

"SABC3 is opening up a dialogue, a dialogue about being a citizen, being conscious, being environmentally friendly, looking at the crises facing the planet; and then looking at what global entertainment can we offer citizens basically for free that you have to pay on subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) services for," van Heerden said.

"This is your public broadcaster giving you fantastic programming and curating a dialogue with our audiences.

"What we've done is to look out into the rest of globe and take programming from Australia and New Zealand, Canada, Brazil, Turkey - and we've really selected programmes that we think will speak to some of the issues that we have in our country and some of the things that we like to celebrate.

"Locally, we're looking at some dramas and building prime time with a new daily drama called The Estate."

Opening up

Van Heerden said the new slogan of "Open Up" is "about opening up about discussing our differences, finding commonality, opening up to seeing the rest of the world, opening up to their stories and seeing ourselves as global citizens."

About the switch to a lime green S3 logo on blue, van Heerden said S3 is "not a natural history channel, but we will be conscious about the environment".

"We want to do entertaining programming around environmental issues. You have thrillers being made in Australia, you have a thriller from Brazil set in an eco-warrior landscape, so it's about the content but entertaining content."