Giant TV group ABS-CBN's shutdown spells losses for Philippine billion-peso ad industry

The ELJ Communications Center in Diliman, Quezon City, the corporate headquarters of ABS-CBN

MANILA, May 8 (Inquirer Business/ANN) -- The day ABS-CBN Corp. was forced by the government to stop airing, advertising executives watched in horror as half their market vanished when millions of television screens across the country went dark.

The ad industry’s growth was fuelled as much by consumerism and its own creativity as the distribution outlets inside people’s homes—the TV set— that were enabled by broadcast giants ABS-CBN and GMA Network Inc.