InterTV Grande Minas

Montes Claros received its first television signals in 1970, when citizens got to see the 1970 FIFA World Cup through microwave relay stations coming from television stations in Belo Horizonte. Since then, the city's mayor Toninho Rebello, fed the dream of setting up a local television station, and for that, formed a company with Elias Siufi, at the time director of Rádio Sociedade (now Super RBV Montes Claros), as well as businessmen Raimundo Tourinho, Geraldo Borges, José Corrêa Machado and João Bosco Martins de Abreu, for a public contest.^[1]

On July 20, 1976, president Ernesto Geisel signed the decree granting VHF channel 4 to the company formed by the businessmen,^[2] and after four years of preparation, it started on September 14, 1980, as TV Montes Claros, as a Rede Bandeirantes affiliate.^[3] The station had state-of-the-art equipment for its time, such as a U-matic editing line, unlike other stations, which were still using film.

In July 1986, TV Montes Claros' minority owners sold their shares to businessman Emanuel Carneiro, owner of Rádio Itatiaia, who started sharing the station's control with Elias Siufi. On June 1, 1987, TV Montes Claros left Rede Bandeirantes and joined Rede Globo, also relaying part of the programming produced by TV Globo Minas in Belo Horizonte. In 1996, a Rede Globo bought Emanuel Carneiro's shares and started controlling 50% of the station, which, on August 7, was renamed TV Grande Minas. At the time, it expanded its signal to the northern, central and north-western regions, as well as Jequitinhonha and Mucuri Valleys, reaching around 170 municipalities, in an area equivalent to 42% of the state of Minas Gerais.^[3][4]

In 2000, Elias Siufi sold his part of the shares, giving TV Grande Minas' cnotrol directly to Globo, which besides the station in Belo Horizonte, was also the owner of TV Panorama of Juiz de Fora and half of the shares of Rede Integração, which covered the Triângulo Mineiro region, and EPTV Sul de Minas, based in Varginha. With the exception of the Belo Horizonte station, its shares on all those stations was sold in March 2002, when Globo decided to cover its investments after a billion dollar economic failure at its subsidiary Globo Cabo.^[5] In October 2003, TV Grande Minas was sold to Fernando Aboudib Camargo, businessman from the state of Espírito Santo, together with TV Alto Litoral and TV Serra+Mar, located in Rio de Janeiro, forming with both, in February 2004, Rede InterTV, becoming InterTV Grande Minas.^[4]