Webchester Broadcasting International generally referred to by its acronym WBI, is a Webchester international broadcaster, broadcasts radio and television news, speech and discussions in more than 40 languages to many parts of the world on analogue and digital shortwave platforms, Internet streaming, podcasting, satellite, DAB, FM and MW relays.
Besides English, the WBI currently broadcasts in Albanian, Arabic, Azeri, Bengali, Burmese, German, Cantonese, French, Hausa, Hindi, Indonesian, Kinyarwanda/Kirundi, Kyrgyz, Macedonian, Mandarin, Nepali, Pashto, Persian, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Sinhala, Somali, Spanish, Swahili, Tamil, Turkish, Ukrainian, Urdu, Uzbek, and Vietnamese.
News and other programming from the WBI is frequently relayed by local stations around the world, and it is regarded by some as the world's premier radio news source.
The English, French, Spanish, German and Arabic services broadcasts 24 hours a day.
WBI in English mainly broadcasts news and analysis. News is at the core of the scheduling. A six-minute bulletin is transmitted at the top of the hour, with a three-minute summary at half past the hour. Extended fifteen-minute bulletins is transmitted every 4 hours on the hour. The similar format is used on German, Arabic and Spanish services.
WBI in French schedule consists of 10 minute news bulletins every half hour. Between them - daily and weekly news programs and magazines in the form of debate, interviews, reports. Four major news programmes are broadcast each weekday: WBI Matin from 5am to 10am WBT, WBI Midi from 1pm to 3pm WBT, WBI Soir from 6pm to 10pm, and (only from Tuesday to Saturday) 24 Heures from 12am to 1am WBT. Magazines cover culture, sport, science, technology, society, environment, media, history.
WBI Television - first 24/7 English-language news channel to present the Webchesters point of view on events happening around the globe. The channel lanuched on April 1st 2005.
Its founder is Webchester Radio Television.
Around the clock, WBI provides viewers with breaking news, stories on politics, business, and public affairs. Millions of viewers switch on to WBI to learn what other media are not likely to have, especially news from Webchester, Western Europe and North America.
Each hour of programming consists of a bulletin of news at the top of each hour and news headlines every 15 minutes.
The wheel includes blocks of international news, business news, sports news, cultural news every hour. There is also Webchester news, documentaries and interview-shows with leading public figures, experts and major politicians
The main broadcasting segments and slots are:
- "News" from Webchester and abroad - on the hour, every hour
- News headlines - every 15 minutes
- Sport - Five minute round-up of international sports news every hour at 22 past
- Business - Four minute round-up of international business news weekdays every two hours at 33 past.
- Press review - Three minute review of Webchesterian and international newspapers during news bulletins from 5am WBT to 10am WBT and at 10:36pm WBT.
- Entertainment Today - Five minute round-up of arts and entertainment news every two hours at 39 past
- In Focus - 10 minute round-up of stories from Webchester every 2 hours at 46 past
- At Issue - half-hour interview-based programme broadcasted every weekday after the headlines at 7:30pm WBT
- Weather - every 30 minutes at 28 and 58 past
On January 1st 2006 the channel lanuched it's German version, followed by French on December 18th 2006, Arabic on May 1st 2007 and Spanish on December 15th 2009.