Rede Tupi

Rede Tupi

Final logo of Rede Tupi introduced in 1979
Type	Commercial network
Country	Brazil
First air date	September 18, 1950 (1950-09-18)
Headquarters	São Paulo, SP
Owner	Diários Associados
Parent	Rádio Difusora de São Paulo S.A.
Key people	Assis Chateaubriand ( 1950–1968)
Dissolved	July 18, 1980 (1980-07-18)

‘’’Rede Tupi’’’ (Portuguese pronunciation: [ˈʁedʒi tuˈpi]; in English, Tupi Network) was a Brazilian free-to-air television network. Its headquarters and main program producer, TV Tupi São Paulo, was inaugurated on September 18, 1950 by journalist Assis Chateaubriand. It was the first TV station to operate in in Latin America. It belonged to Diários Associados (Associated Journal), which at the time, holding several newspapers and radios, was one of the largest media conglomerates in Brazil. Other channels would be inaugurated by the group in some localities of the country, forming the nucleus of the first national television network.

During the 1950s, TV Tupi was the channel with the highest audience in Brazil, followed by TV Record/TV Rio (Rede das Emissoras Unidas) and TV Paulista. From the 1960s, the channel would lose the audience leadership to TV Record and later the second place to TV Excelsior, occupying the third place. In 1967, it was surpassed in audience by TV Globo, assuming the fourth place of audience in the remainder of the decade. During the 1970s, due to the closing of TV Excelsior, it again occupied third place, being surpassed by Rede Globo, in first place since 1969, and by TV Record in second place. In 1972, there were 64 television stations in the country. Most were limited to retransmitting the programming of the three major networks: Globo, Record and Tupi. On July 18, 1980, due to administrative and financial problems, Tupi went off the air with part of its broadcast licenses revoked by the Federal Government of Brazil.

The station's assets were acquired by Grupo Silvio Santos (owner of SBT), Grupo Bloch (owner of Rede Manchete, which would close in 1999 and would have its concessions acquired by RedeTV!) and by Grupo Abril.