A+E Global Media

A&E Television Networks, LLC, doing business as A+E Global Media (formerly A+E Networks) is an American multinational broadcasting company owned and operated as a 50–50 joint venture between Hearst Communications and The Walt Disney Company through the General Entertainment Content unit of its Entertainment division. It owns several non-fiction and entertainment-based television brands, including A&E, History Channel, Lifetime, FYI and their associated sister channels, as well as holding stakes in, or licenses, their international branches.

A&E was formed from the merger of the Alpha Repertory Television Service and the Entertainment Channel, a premium cable channel, in 1984 with their respective owners keeping stakes in the new company. Thus A&E's shareholders were Hearst and ABC (from ARTS) and Radio City Music Hall (Rockefeller Group) and RCA, then the parent of NBC (from Entertainment Channel). The company launched A&E, at the time known as the Arts & Entertainment Network, on February 1, 1984, as a block on Nickelodeon to fill in the time slot that ARTS held, as ARTS was a block on Nick. In 1985, the partners spun off A&E into its own 24 hour channel, and Nickelodeon later created Nick at Nite to fill in the time slot that A&E formerly held.

In 1990, after having aired episodes of its original 1960's version starting in 1987, A&E acquired rights to, and started producing new episodes of, the documentary series Biography— which became the channel's flagship program. The network also introduced its own companion magazine A&E Monthly.

The company indicated that plans for a history channel were in the works in 1993; it purchased the Lou Reda Productions documentary library and long-term rights for the Hearst Entertainment documentaries archive. In June 1993, the Rockefeller Group's Radio City Music Hall sold its 12.5% stake in A&E to the other three partners (now including NBC in place of RCA after GE's purchase of the latter in 1986) with NBC owning 25% and the other two 37.5% each. Also that month, a new production unit was set up.

The A&E channel expanded to Canada, and later Mexico from 1993 to 1994. Biography began airing 5 nights a week in 1994. Also in 1994, A&E, on its 10th anniversary, changed its name from Arts and Entertainment to A&E.

A&E Networks launched the History Channel on January 1, 1995, with its UK counterpart following on November 1 in partnership with British Sky Broadcasting. A&E Networks considered History to be the driver in international expansion due to a lack of international rights to A&E international co-productions. As expected, the History Channel led A&E's overseas expansion in Brazil with TVA (April 1996), the Nordic and Baltic regions with Modern Times Group (1997), and in Canada (1997). By 1997, the company had started its AETN International division.

Formerly only direct sales, A&E Home Video initiated a six-month trial in which Barnes & Noble would sell the "Biography" line in stores, which became permanent in 1996. THC debuted in two other media in September 1996 with a radio program on ABC Radio Networks and Borders Books stocking THC videos.

The 'Biography' franchise continued to expand with a website in July 1996, a children's version launched in fall 1996, an audiotape line in 1997, telefilm development, a Crown published short biography line and debuted its magazine which replaced A&E Monthly. During the 1998–1999 season, Biography: American Justice and Biography Movies debuted.