More than ten years ago, STB became the first Ukrainian TV channel setting a trend for talent shows in different areas and uniting them under the common idea that “Everything is possible!” The main idea of each reality show created by the channel is that you can achieve your goal, change yourself and your life for the better.
During all these years, Ukrainian viewers know that with STB they can fulfil their dreams: improve their health, find love, start and preserve a family, learn the truth, get justice and start a career on a big stage. Such STB projects as X-Factor, The Psychic Challenge, Masterchef, The Bachelor/The Bachelorette, The Biggest Loser, So You Think You Can Dance, Ukraine’s Got Talent, Embarrassing Bodies, Everything Will Be Okay, One for All and others help viewers with that.
For more than twenty years, Ukrainians have trusted Vikna-News on STB for its high journalistic standards.
Since 2016, thanks to STB’s participation, the National Selection for Eurovision has become the main annual musical event in Ukraine, attracting the audience’s interest and trust in the contest.
In 2018, STB announced reformatting of its broadcasting schedule and prioritized TV serials. The channel is developing its TV serial strategy and increasing the amount of such content produced by Starlight Production and in partnership with other producers.
The major costume drama Love In Chains was commissioned by STB. After a tremendously successful launch on STB, Love in Chains continues to conquer the international market. In July 2019, the show had remarkable success on the Polish TV channel TVP1. Polish viewers discussed the project alongside Game of Thrones and are now waiting for next season. Then, viewers from Lithuania, Kazakhstan, Russia and Belarus saw the show. The rights were sold to Japan, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Latvia, Estonia, Georgia, Latin America and the Balkans. In the summer of 2020, the show was sold to Spain. It became the first Ukrainian multi-series drama1 acquired by a Spanish TV channel. And North American viewers can now watch Love in Chains on Amazon Prime.
Today STB is a family, an evocative and socially active TV channel offering the best large-scale shows and unique reality projects. About 80%2 of STB’s broadcasts are projects of its own production. It tells stories that inspire, evoke deep empathy, motivate changes and help you achieve your dreams and believe that anything in life is possible.
[1] Source.
[2] According to STB channel's calculations.
Genre: talent show
For the 30th anniversary of Ukrainian independence, the channel STB TV and the Starlight Media group are working on a special gift for the whole country ― a new season of the legendary show Ukraine’s Got Talent. The show will premiere on STB this fall. It will be a special and innovative season. For the first time, Ukraine will see unique performances involving the latest technology. Fellow Ukrainians who have won acclaim from the whole world will be on stage. Viewers will see incredible, sometimes shocking talents, legendary comebacks of beloved heroes, and some new names. And together with the all-star judges, the nation will choose Ukraine’s top talent.
The Ukrainian adaptation of the exceedingly successful global Got Talent format is a winner of professional television awards and prizes. Over 60 countries have produced their version of this project, and it has been a hit on television for over 15 years.
Genre: romantic reality TV show
The best romantic reality TV show in the country, in which a woman chooses her man. The Ukrainian adaptation of WarnerBros.’ successful show, The Bachelorette. The first season of the project aired on STB in the fall of 2020 and, according to the ratings, it turned out to be the best program of the year on Ukrainian TV. In the finale, the first Ukrainian Bachelorette, actress Ksenia Mishyna, chose a writer from Kvartal 95 Studio, Oleksandr Ellert. The couple has remained in a relationship since the end of the project.
This fall, the famous singer Zlata Ognevich will look for her love in The Bachelorette.
Presenter: Hryhoriy Reshetnik
Genre: cooking reality TV show
The best cooking reality TV show in the country. Winner of many professional TV awards. The Ukrainian adaptation of the world-famous British MasterChef format. First aired on STB in 2011, it immediately won the hearts of millions of Ukrainians. For 10 years on STB, MasterChef has changed how Ukrainians think about food culture and raised a whole generation of successful restaurant owners. Each year, amateur cooks strive to present their dishes to the best chefs in the country to get a chance to be among the project’s top 20 participants. In the fight for the title of the strongest, they must pass a series of culinary tests. The winner will receive a cash prize and training at the prestigious French culinary school, Le Cordon Bleu.
Judges: Héctor Jiménez-Bravo, Volodymyr Yaroslavskyi, Olha Martynovska
Genre: mystic reality TV show
The legendary project about people with superpowers returns to STB. This fall, viewers will take in the 21st season of Psychic Challenge!
Since the inception of this project, Ukrainians have never stopped asking: is what they’re seeing on their TV screens actually true? Are the participants really psychics? For the first time in the history of the project, ordinary people will have the opportunity to test the abilities of psychics in person. In each episode, a representative from among the common people will join the project’s resident experts to monitor the challenge in real-time.
Presenter: Pavlo Kostitsyn
Project judges: Pavlo Kostitsyn, Alena Kurilova, Hayal Alekperov, and a representative from among the common people
Genre: family psychological reality TV show
A successful reality TV show featuring mothers with radically different views on child-rearing competing for the title of the best mom. Every week, four mothers with different principles on raising their children and different attitudes toward life visit each other, get to know their competitors’ children, assess the general atmosphere in the family, and rate their rivals in three categories: parenting, housekeeping, and self-fulfillment. During the week, Dmytro Karpachov observes the mothers, comments on their actions and decisions, gives practical advice, and in the finale, each heroine receives some points from him. The one who gets the highest number of points gets the title of SuperMom at the end of the week.
Each episode of the show is a valuable treasure trove of tips from the heroines and useful recommendations from the presenter with which every female viewer can become a supermom.
Genre: red-hot social project
For 10 years, the social project One for All has been defending justice and protecting the rights of Ukrainians. The only project on Ukrainian TV that takes on the most difficult cases to help victims find the truth and mete out much-deserved punishment for the perpetrators. Following investigations carried out by One for All journalists, situations that had previously been hushed up receive wide media coverage and are passed on to law enforcement agencies.
Presenter: Serhiy Kostyra, practicing lawyer, forensic specialist, and psychologist
Genre: psychological project
A successful, locally developed project that uses DNA tests to help heroes resolve difficult family situations and get only correct answers to the questions of their lives. Only a DNA test with 99.9% accuracy will tell if the people in the studio are related, whether someone had been cheating, and who left their genetic material at the crime scene.
Presenter: Tetiana Vysotska
Genre: scripted reality TV show
The Blind project takes the life stories of real people as its inspiration. Baba Liuba is a blind clairvoyant and the show’s main character. She is a vessel for the wisdom of our ancestors and reads people who come to her for help. Using omens and special knowledge, she helps the protagonists protect themselves and their loved ones from misfortune. Her granddaughter Katia helps the sorceress interact with the world around her. She blogs about the stories of those seeking help from her grandmother. And she also shares tips on why you should not accept coins as gifts, how a mirror in the bedroom can destroy the most stable marriage, and the dangers of a messy house.
Genre: entertaining cooking show
A Ukrainian adaptation of the exceedingly popular British project Come Dine with Me from ITV. In each episode, four different contestants with radically dissimilar ideas of the ideal dinner party meet at the same table. The protagonists of the project are people of various professions, income, age, hobbies, life aspirations, and culinary preferences. They don’t have to know how to cook restaurant-like food or aspire to get a Michelin star. Their main task is to please their competitors, with whom they are completely unacquainted, show them hospitality, and provide them with delicious food. The protagonists cook their special dishes, visit each other’s homes, offer their hospitality, and judge the food and hospitality of their opponents, ultimately crowning the winner. who receives a monetary prize.
Genre: family comedy reality TV show
As a channel, STB has been developing to help reeducate lazy and irresponsible dads for 10 years. The project team sends a mother, tired of domestic problems and the neglect of her husband, on a week-long holiday. While the father stays home with the children. And while the mother, for the first time in many years, is truly relaxed and devoting her time only to herself, the father has all the parental and domestic duties to fulfill. Or at least learn to fulfill. The family gets a monetary prize if he rises to the challenge. But the money is not the point of the project. It aims to teach fathers a lesson, particularly those who had thus far been firmly convinced that household chores and childminding are “not a man’s job.”
Genre: entertainment project about the lives of celebrities
Every Saturday, The Unbelievable Truth about the Celebrities reveals interesting details about Ukrainian and Hollywood celebrities. In each episode, viewers can discover lots of insider information about the most popular stars. Journalists go backstage and into stars’ homes, revealing the secrets of their personal lives and the ways they raise their children, peek into the trunks of their cars, phones, and even purses.
Genre: analytical newscast
The first independent news in Ukraine aired on September 4, 1995. For 25 years, Vikna-News upheld high standards of journalism and has been trusted by millions of viewers. Honesty toward the audience is a fundamental rule upon which the program editorial policy is based.
Vikna-News is among the leaders of Ukrainian news and analytical programs. Every day, the journalists go to the ground zero of the most high-profile events that affect the country’s unfolding history, becoming the first to tell Ukrainians about them. Vikna-News’ special projects have often received much acclaim and recognition from the experts.
Over 25 years, the Vikna-News team has featured many stars of modern journalism: Olena Froliak, Andrii Kulikov, Iryna Vannikova, Mykola Veresen, Oleksii Mustafin, Serhii Popov, Volodymyr Ariev, Olha Chervakova, Roman Skrypin, Vitalii Portnikov, Larisa Ivshina, Serhii Shvets, Iryna Malykhina, Rostislav Khotin, and many others.
Repeated winner of the national Teletriumph Award in the Best News Program, Best Reporter, and Best News Anchor categories.
Anchors: Tetiana Vysotska, Yana Brenzei, Olha Kucher, and Volodymyr Pavliuk
Genre: costume drama
A major costume drama produced by STB and FILM.UA. It tells of the complicated path the serf Kateryna Verbytska takes toward happiness and love. She was brought up by her godmother Anna as a lady of noble blood, but in reality, she was only the property of landlord Petro Chervinsky. At the end of season 2, Kateryna finally received her hard-won freedom and married her beloved Andrii Zhadan. But as soon as the church choir sang the Polychronion over their heads, an unknown man drove a knife into Andriy’s chest and turned long-awaited happiness into a sudden nightmare...
Genre: detective thriller
A multi-episode detective project. Ukrainian adaptation of the well-known TeleAlliance Israel format. A team of professionals from the Special Investigation Agency (SIA) under Olha Kosach specializes in solving the most difficult cases. Using their unique and in-depth knowledge of pathology, ballistics, analytics, the latest computer technology, laboratory research, investigative work, and modern gadgets, the SIA experts manage to discover the trace that every criminal always leaves at the crime scene in one form or another.
Starring: Tetiana Kravchenko, Antonina Khyzhniak, Oleksandr Bondar, Albina Pererva, Borys Heorhiievskyi, Oleksii Suvorovtsev, Bohdan Ruban, Olena Voznesenska, etc.
Genre: historical drama
A 10-episode historical costume drama based on the novel by Lviv writer Natalia Hurnytska named Coffee Melody in Cardamom Tone. The story of the forbidden love of the young Anna for an older married Polish nobleman, Adam, unfolds in 19th-century Lviv during the Springtime of the Peoples.
Shooting took place in Lviv, Lviv region, and Kyiv.
