Albanian Screen

Albanian Screen (AS) was a national Albanian privately owned television channel based in Tirana, Albania. It was founded in 2000 as Alsat National Television under the leadership of entrepreneur Vebi Velija. Alsat was short for “Albanian Satellite Television”.^[1] It was the fourth private television channel in the Albanian market, and in 2003 it became the first Albanian television channel available via satellite signal through Eutelsat.^[2][3] The channel had a generalist programming format.

AS covered the entire territory of Albania via terrestrial transmission, used digital terrestrial signal in Tirana, and broadcast via satellite through Eutelsat across all of Europe, North America, and Asia.

In March 2006, a sister channel Alsat-M (now continuing under the name Alsat) was established as its branch in North Macedonia.^[3]

In March 2011, Alsat was rebranded as Albanian Screen under the new ownership of oil magnate Rezart Taçi,^[4] who also served as its General Director.^[5]

Although it generated an annual turnover of 323 million Lek (ranking third by revenue), AS incurred annual losses of up to 30 million Lek. The channel ceased operations on 5 June 2015 due to bankruptcy, and the salaries of around 180 employees were settled during the liquidation process.^[6][7][8] After the closure, some employees filed lawsuits against Rezart Taçi for unpaid social security contributions following dismissal.^[9]