ESPN STAR Sports will launch its first joint venture led dedicated sports cable channel in Korea on November 1.

Known as MBC-ESPN Sports, the channel will be an entirely localised sports service that delivers live and exclusive coverage of major sports events, launched in association with Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation. This includes seven live and exclusive games per week of Major League Baseball (MLB) and two live and exclusive games per week each from the National Basketball Association (NBA) and the Korean Football League.

MBC-ESPN will also air coverage of the Korean Open Golf Tournament, Korean Intercontinental Football and the ATP Tour. This is in addition to popular ESS programs such as the English Premier League and UEFA Champions' League. Transmitted entirely in Korean, MBC-ESPN's localized programming includes on-air presentation, commentary, graphics and dedicated promos. ESS will provide sports programming on MBC-ESPN while MBC provides the on-the-ground production facilities needed to customize and re-transmit the locally versioned feed from Seoul.

ESS officials say, "We began by launching dedicated feeds to key Asian markets, followed by versioning our programming to the local language. We've now taken it a step further by working with the strongest local partners in Korea who have the resources and expertise to help us continue providing compelling sports programming to our viewers, expertly localised." MBC-ESPN is the ninth feed of ESS and the fifth feed of ESPN in Asia.