United Broadcasting Service

UBS (an initialism of the United Broadcasting Service) is an American television network that is the flagship property of the UBS Group, owned by UBS Corp, a division of TimeWarner.

The network was intended to launch on January 1, 2018, but the launch was pushed back to June 10, 2018, for a summer launch, with "UBS's First Night" to be the network's first program.

The network was formed as a result of UBS Corp's acquisition of Ion Media in 2014.

Formation and Launch
In the spring of 2014, UBS Corp (known at the time as SurgeCo) acquired Ion Media, shortly after the acquisition, rumors began of Ion to be relaunched into a new network, as the company had been wanted to branch out into broadcasting for a long time. In the summer of 2015, SurgeCo announced Project U, a attempt to launch a new broadcast network in the United States. SurgeCo President Jay Johnson said in a press release regarding the project:"'SurgeCo is a ever-growing media company, from our inception in the summer of 2012, we've had a vision of being not only a content creator, but a content distributor, and we've done that through our digital brands and cable networks we've have been built off of, but now it's time to take that nationally and internationally, with the launch of this new united network. With the launch, we hope to build a brand through the network's News, Sports, and entertainment programming.'"In June of 2015, SurgeCo began selling off stations that were not needed, and reduced O&O ownership to the maximum of 39% the most a company can own, then all stations switched to the VHF band, and began using a new temporary brand called "The U" in order to phase out the "Ion" branding, ("The U" would later be used as the name of UBS Networks's flagship cable network.) In September of 2015, SurgeCo announced the network would be called UBS, and would launch in early 2018.

In Early 2017, SurgeCo announced that it would be renaming and reorganizing the company as UBS Corp, and made began a round of acquisitions. Among the acquisitions were Sony Entertainment, containing the assets of Sony Pictures, Sony Music, and Sony/ATV. MGM Holdings and MGM's pre-1986 library, beIN media Group, Lionsgate, STX and Legendary Entertainment, Entertainment One and Entertainment Studios, Weigel Broadcasting, and more. UBS also extended the company's cable network offerings by buying Crown Media Holdings, AMC Networks, UP, Revolt, Aspire, Fuse, and more, for over $500 million. UBS later bought a spun off company called U Media, which was formed following The Buddy Company's spin off of both national and international assets that were deemed no longer needed by Buddy. UBS offered to buy the company for $3 Billion, but bought it for $2.5 Billion.

UBS then announced that it would be buying Searchlight Entertainment Group, containing the assets that were not bought by Disney, for $250 million. UBS also bought Core Media Group, Banijay, Tinopolis, Celador and Endomol Shine for $700 Million.

In late 2017, UBS entered talks to be bought by TimeWarner, and later agreed to be bought by TW for $25 Billion.