iTV, whose revolutionary gung-ho approach to news gathering in the country has taken it to the No.1 spot since launching in 1996, recently announced it would increase its editorial team by 30 to a total of 300 and focus more on crime news programmes.
The channel has already spent 100 million baht (about US$2.3 million) this year upgrading its programmes.
The independent broadcaster's move is seen in some circles as a direct response to the Mass Communications Organisation of Thailand's (MCOT) hefty expansion of its news coverage on Channel 9.
But media buyers have adopted a wait-and-see approach before labelling the 25-year-old station, which badly trails iTV and channels 3 and 7 in the ratings, a more attractive proposition.
"At the moment Channel 9 is not looking that enticing," said Wannee Ruttanaphon, managing director of Initiative Media.
"It looks like they're copying iTV when they first launched."
Channel 9, under MCOT director general Mingkwan Sangsuwan and board chief Rewat Chumchalrem, recently relaunched itself as Modernine Television in an attempt to project a stronger, more modern image to attract much-needed viewers through round-the-clock news coverage.
But Wannee said the expanded news coverage could prove a ratings hindrance if it ate into valuable prime-time viewing. "At the moment, it's just news, news, news and there's a limited audience who love to consume news all the time," she said. Her point came as Asia Market Intelligence' latest PAX survey found that interest in entertainment and educational content was on the rise at the expense of news. (See attached PAX supplement).
Ichaya Santitrakul, managing partner of media buyer Brand Connections, described the revamp as "good but not good enough".
"If they don't make their non-news programmes stronger, they can't compete with the other stations," she said.
Meanwhile, MCOT's Mingkwan said commercial airtime sales during prime-time news had already increased following the relaunch.
Channel 7 currently charges the highest advertising rate at 280,000 baht per minute during prime-time news, followed by Channel 3 at 260,000 baht and iTV at 250,000 baht. Channel 9 charges only 110,000 baht per minute and also gives state agencies discounts of between 40 to 50 per cent.