Slogan Very Real Language English Owned by NBCUniversal | Country United States Founded 1998 Motto Very Real | |
Launched February 2, 2000; 17 years ago (2000-02-02) Picture format NTSC (480i)
HDTV (1080i) Sister channel(s) E!
Bravo
Esquire Network Headquarters New York City, New York, United States Founders Oprah Winfrey, Tom Werner, Marcy Carsey, Caryn Mandabach, Geraldine B. Laybourne TV shows Bad Girls Club, Sisterhood of Hip Hop, The Prancing Elites Pro, Snapped, Strut Profiles | ||
Oxygen is an American digital cable and satellite television channel that is owned by Oxygen Media, LLC, a subsidiary of the NBCUniversal Cable division of NBCUniversal, all owned by Comcast. Similar to Lifetime and WE tv, the channel features programming targeted at women, including original reality television series, acquired scripted series and feature films.
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As of February 2015, approximately 77.5 million American households (66.5% of households with television) receive Oxygen. In early 2014, it was announced that Oxygen would rebrand on October 7, 2014 alongside a new logo in an effort to target young female viewers.
History
The privately held company Oxygen Media was founded in 1998 by former Nickelodeon executive Geraldine Laybourne, talk show host Oprah Winfrey, and producers Marcy Carsey, Tom Werner and Caryn Mandabach (of Carsey-Werner fame). Geraldine Laybourne was the service's founder, chairwoman, and CEO, staying with the channel until the NBCUniversal sale. The company's cable network Oxygen launched on February 2, 2000.
The channel was initially headquartered at Battery Park City in New York City, near the World Trade Center. It was knocked off the air on September 11, 2001; the Time Warner Cable-owned regional news channel NY1 was broadcast to all Oxygen subscribers across the country until the studio reopened within a week after the attack.
The network's operations were subsequently consolidated in the Chelsea Market, a former Nabisco factory at 15th Street and Ninth Avenue in New York City. Oxygen's operations are now based at 30 Rockefeller Plaza as part of Comcast's consolidation of its newly owned NBCUniversal properties.
The channel originally began as an interactive service focusing on original programming with some reruns (such as Kate & Allie), and featured a black bar at the bottom of the screen (referred to as "the stripe", it occupied the bottom 12% of the screen) which would show various information (the interactive part involved the channel's website); the technique was cloned by Spike's precursor The New TNN; the stripe was eventually dropped. Prior to 2005, the channel carried a limited schedule of regular season WNBA games produced by NBA TV. The channel later began to focus chiefly on reality shows, reruns, and movies. For a time during the talk show's syndication run, Oxygen aired week-delayed repeats of The Tyra Banks Show. The yoga/meditation/exercise program Inhale was the last inaugural Oxygen program on air into the channel's NBC Universal era, albeit in repeats; it was canceled in 2010.
Campus Ladies, Bliss, Oprah After the Show, Talk Sex with Sue Johanson, The Janice Dickinson Modeling Agency, Snapped, Girls Behaving Badly and The Bad Girls Club, a reality series, are some of the signature shows on the channel. Oxygen has been available on DirecTV for many years, and arrived on Dish Network in early 2006 during that provider's carriage conflict with Lifetime.
On October 9, 2007, NBC Universal announced it would be purchasing Oxygen for $925 million. The sale was completed on November 20, 2007. NBC Universal's cable division announced at an industry upfront presentation on April 23, 2008, that the channel would rebrand and unveil a new logo on June 17, 2008; in the months since the sale the Oh! heading was dropped from the channel's visual branding. The logo premiered one week early on June 8, 2008.
For the 2008 Summer Olympics, Oxygen aired events and programming weeknights relating to gymnastics, equestrian, and synchronized swimming through NBC Sports's broadcast agreement for the Olympics. On June 29, 2009, Oxygen premiered Dance Your Ass Off, a reality dance competition program in which overweight people dance while they lose weight; the program was cancelled after its second season due to low ratings. On April 5, 2010, Oxygen launched its second night of original programming with the fifth-season premiere of Tori & Dean: Home Sweet Hollywood.
Following the acquisition of NBC Universal by Comcast and the last-minute replacement of its cable channel Style Network with Esquire Network (which was originally intended to replace G4) on September 23, 2013, some of its acquired programs were dispersed to Oxygen.
On April 8, 2014, it was announced that Oxygen would drop its "Live Out Loud" slogan and shift the networks target audience.
In December 2016, it was reported that NBCUniversal was considering re-formatting Oxygen as a crime-oriented channel, building upon the success of its Crime Time block. It was reported that NBC had been in talks with Dick Wolf—producer of the Law and Order and Chicago franchises, to take an equity stake in a re-branded channel that could be anchored by the programs.
In February 2017, NBCUniversal confirmed that it planned to re-format Oxygen with a focus on true crime programming aimed towards women, including a new season of the Dick Wolf-produced Cold Justice (which had been cancelled by TNT). The change will be accompanied by a larger re-branding later in the year, which may or may not keep the Oxygen name. NBCUniversal Lifestyle Networks president Frances Berwick stated that the network had not determined the fate of the network's non-crime programming, such as Bad Girls Club, after the full re-branding takes effect. It was also explained that while Dick Wolf would be
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Oxygen HD
Oxygen HD was launched in March 2011 as high definition simulcast feed, eventually becoming the main feed with the standard definition feed being originated at the cable provider headend through downscaling. It is available through most providers.