Two rivals, one empire
The story begins with a rivalry. On 21 August 1991, Hong Kong’s STAR TV launched Prime Sports — later renamed STAR Sports — as part of Asia’s first pan-regional satellite bouquet. Less than a year later, American giant ESPN arrived with its own Asian channel run from Singapore. Both fought for the same viewers and the same rights across the continent, and both lost money doing it.
In October 1996 the rivals called a truce. ESPN Inc. (owned by Walt Disney and Hearst) and News Corporation’s STAR TV merged their Asian sports operations into a single 50:50 joint venture: ESPN STAR Sports, headquartered in Singapore. The combined company became the dominant sports broadcaster in Asia, beaming localised ESPN and STAR Sports feeds into more than 24 markets.
In Malaysia the two channels rode on Astro from the platform’s early years, and the line-up shaped a generation of fandom: live English Premier League, Formula 1, MotoGP, Grand Slam tennis, badminton, cricket, and the nightly SportsCenter. The Malaysian feed also carried AFC competitions and the AFF Suzuki Cup — fixtures of the regional football calendar.
The Malaysia connection
ESS didn’t just broadcast into Malaysia — it staged events here. Kuala Lumpur hosted the Asian X Games in 2003 and 2004 and the KL World 5’s futsal tournament in 2003.
In October 2005, ESS signed a multi-year partnership with Malaysia’s Ministry of Youth and Sports to grow sports participation nationwide — and launched a Malaysian edition of SportsCenter under it.
