Aertel cost RTÉ €200,000 per annum, a new report has revealed.
The teletext service – which provided viewers with news, sport and entertainment information for nearly 4 decades – is set to be shut down later this month.
According to the figures provided to the Irish Daily Mail under a Freedom of Information claim, RTÉ spent almost €3million to keep the service going between 2014 and 2018.
According to FoI, RTÉ spent 70% of the total sum on transmission and distribution.
On Tuesday, RTÉ revealed that it will be shutting down Aertel for good on October 12.
In a statement, the state broadcaster explained: “In RTÉ’s Strategy 2024, published in 2019, RTÉ announced the closure of Aertel as part of its ongoing and necessary evolution into a public service media organisation, offering a blend of live and on-demand services and compelling and varied programming and content to audiences, when and where they want.”
“Since 2019, due to the need to prioritise the delivery of digital services to meet growing audience demand, RTÉ has diverted resources previously allocated to the Aertel service towards the improvement of RTÉ’s online services such as RTE.ie, RTÉ Player, the RTÉ News app and the RTÉ Radio Player app.”
