• by Wayne Friedman , Fern Siegel , November 13, 2013

NBCU Cable Group is now a full owner in the preschool network Sprout, buying out PBS and HIT Television Ventures.

The 8-year-old Sprout -- a joint venture of Comcast, PBS, Sesame Workshop and HIT -- enhances the cabler's family programming lineup. Launched as a 24-hour digital destination for the 2- to-5-year-old set, it eventually landed in 60 million homes and generating more than 1.5 billion video-on-demand views, per Sprout President Sandy Wax.

Original Sprout programs include "The Chica Show" and "Noodle and Doodle," as well as PBS' "Caillou."

Bonnie Hammer, chair, NBCU Cable Entertainment, said the network saw "enormous potential" in Sprout, adding the acquisition "furthers our strategy to create and deliver the best content across all of our audiences."

The deal firmly positions Sprout within NBCU existing cable channels, including USA, E!, Bravo and Hammer's newly launched Esquire Network, which replaced the Style network. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Viewers also submit artwork, birthday wishes and videos to SproutOnline.com, which has received over 5 million viewer interactions to-date, per the company.

Looking at third-quarter Nielsen 2013 ratings data, Sprout was down 2% in total day average ratings to 164,000 viewers and off 7% in prime-time viewership to 191,000.

By way of comparison, another preschool kids TV network, Nick Jr., was off 40% in total day average viewership to 345,000 and down 45% in prime-time to 464,000 viewers.

Another relatively new kids network, The Hub -- a partnership with Discovery Communications and Hasbro -- has seen better results, up 2% to 127,000 total day viewers and 15% higher in prime-time to 188,000 average viewers.