Italia 1

Italia 1 ( Italian pronunciation ) is an Italian free-to-air television channel on the Mediaset network, owned by MFE - MediaForEurope. It is oriented at both young and adult people.

Italia 1 was launched on 3 January 1982 and, originally, was owned by Rusconi; after a few months, however, due to the aggressive dumping practices of Silvio Berlusconi's rival network Canale 5, Rusconi was forced to sell the majority of his company to Fininvest, allowing Berlusconi to further strengthen his media holdings.

Launch & Early Years
Launched on 3 January 1982 by print media editor Edilio Rusconi, Italia 1 was born from the idea of a network supported by twenty regional broadcasting stations, some owned by Rusconi himself and others simply affiliated to broadcast throughout Italian territory on the 'ploy' of interconnection. The lead broadcasting station is Milan-based Antenna Nord, but Rome's Quinta Rete also has an important role. Lillo Tombolini is the executive director. The channel's presenter is a young Gabriella Golia, who was already the face of Antenna Nord.

During its early years, Rusconi's growing national channel starts its programming at noon, with a segment dedicated to children, during which various cartoons and anime series (particularly western cartoons) are broadcast, as well as successful original television series such as Star Trek, then in the early afternoon air-time is given to region-specific broadcasts, later restarting the national broadcast with more television series and a mid-afternoon 80's and 90's children's programming block called Bim Bum Bam, which offers episodes from numerous cartoon/animated series over the years, predominantly more American and European, such as The Smurfs, Snorks, Count Duckula, Police Academy, Iznogoud, Inspector Gadget, Batman: The Animated Series, Spiff and Hercules, and Alvin and the Chipmunks among others. In the late afternoon hours, the channel again broadcasts from local stations, alongside airing an episode of a television series the following hour (such as Paper Moon). Generally in the early evening hours, two movies and one television series is broadcast. The network also offers plenty of air-time to sport programs dedicated to soccer, boxing, basketball and motor racing, including Andrea De Adamich's Grand Prix. Primetime hours on Italia 1 were dedicated to predominantly American imports such as Falcon Crest, Kojak, The Big Valley, Project UFO, and Mork & Mindy.

On 23 April 1982, an official agreement was made between Gruppo Rusconi and the American network CBS for technical assistance and program sharing. However, only a few months after its appearance on a national scale funds began to dwindle, mostly due to exorbitant costs of managing broadcast transmission systems, something a print editing house such as Rusconi probably wasn't aware of, but also due to the aggressive advertising policy from its main rival network, Canale 5. In fact, Rusconi's network relied on an external advertising provider, la Publikompass, to sell advertising space while Berlusconi's channel took advantage of owning its own advertising provider, Publitalia, which could easily personalize ad packages to clients using dumping practices.

On 6 September 1982, Rusconi signed a collaboration agreement with Silvio Berlusconi, the owner of Canale 5, mainly focusing on a common policy for the management of advertising limits but also concerning the communal use of high frequency networks and the sharing of some programs. However, on 30 November of that same year, the Rusconi group are forced to sell the network for about 29 billion lire (approximately €15 Million) to Berlusconi, who merges it with "Rete 10", also owned by Berlusconi, to found the new Italia 1, that according to the Fininvest company is oriented for a young audience.

Share 24h* Italia 1
Below, average monthly listening data in the total day received by the issuer.
 * Average Monthly Day on Target Individuals 4+

Network's faces
In the past Italia 1 had its advertisers. As mentioned, the historical face of the network announcing the programs was Gabriella Golia, who has served for 20 years from 1982 to 2002 (Golia was also announcer of Antenna Nord). Veronica Ghinzani from 1982 to 1984, Manuela Blanchard Beillard in the early 1980s, Fiorella Pierobon from 1982 to 1984 (then official announcer of Canale 5), Licia Colò from 1982 to 1985. In 2002 Italia 1 eliminated the figure of "Miss Goodnight" (the same thing happened in Canale 5 in December 2005).

The historic voice of Italia 1's promo was Fabrizio Casadio, who announced them from 9 January 1984 to 5 October 1997. Since 1 January 2009, promotions are announced by Raffaele Farina.