Bubble bursts for Irish ‘MTV’ duo as ad revenue dries up

THE bubble has burst for two young Irish entrepreneurs who took on MTV.

But James Hyland, 24, from Mitchelstown, in Co Cork and his business partner, Dubliner Lee Walsh, have refused to let the recession get them down.

They pulled the plug on their 24-hour satellite TV music channel, Bubble Hits, at the weekend after failing to raise enough advertising revenue. Its website has also been removed.

“It was costing us money to run. We were just consistently putting money into it and we had to consider our other businesses which are making money,” Mr Hyland said.

“I don’t see it as a failure. It worked. We had two million viewers a week in the UK and since we switched it off, we have had a huge response. The advertising revenue just wasn’t coming in.”

Hyland, 24, is a hugely successful music and entertainment entrepreneur.

At the age of 12, he started a pirate radio station, Happiness FM, in Michelstown. After leaving school at 16, he worked with Tipp FM before founding concert promotions company Noodle Promotions. Then came the duo’s big break.

Their main company, Pro Audio Images, which does audio production, commercials and voice-over work for dozens of Irish radio stations, was commissioned to provide the voice-overs for Jamster’s adverts for their Crazy Frog character and mobile phone ringtone.

The ringtone became a global sensation and made the duo millions which they used to set up Bubble Hits.

The channel began broadcasting in England in August 2006. Bubble Hits Ireland was subsequently launched to provide a platform for young Irish artists and bands.

Its presenters included Louis Walsh, model Glenda Gilson and former Six singer Liam McKenna. It was added to the Sky network, which resulted in the channel getting more than 20 million viewer hits each month. Mr Hyland claimed at one stage that the channel attracted twice as many viewers as MTV in Ireland.