BBC Worldwide Limited is the wholly owned
commercial subsidiary of the
British Broadcasting
Corporation, formed out of a restructuring of its predecessor
BBC Enterprises in 1995. In the year to 31 March
2009 it made a profit of £86m on a turnover of £1.04bn, mainly
affected by the administration of
Woolworths Group with which BBC Worldwide
has joint ownership of
2 Entertain. The
company had made a profit of £118m on a turnover of £916m in the
previous financial year.
Operations
Worldwide is responsible for a wide range of commercial activities,
primarily connected in some way with the output and public purposes
of the main BBC. The company's work includes investment in
television production. BBC Worldwide will often
provide additional budget for BBC productions in return for various
commercial rights to the programmes, and has also done so for
non-BBC programmes as well, such as the
Red Production Company drama
Mine
All Mine for the BBC's rival
ITV network in
2004. In 2006, a Content & Production business, headed by
former BBC controller of entertainment Wayne Garvie, was formed to
produce local versions of BBC formats overseas (maximising revenues
by receiving a production fee from the local broadcaster as well as
a sum from selling the initial re-versioning rights). BBC Worldwide
has also, since, taken a 25% stake in Left Bank Pictures, a
newly-formed independent film & TV production company, owned
and run by former ITV Productions controller of comedy and drama
Andy Harries, and a 25% stake in
Cliffhanger Productions – an independent production company that
focuses on returning drama for UK networks.
Other
major areas of business include international programming sales and
distribution, foreign and domestic satellite and cable television channels (such as UKTV in the UK, BBC America
in the United
States
and BBC
Entertainment in India
), book
publishing (through Random House), magazine publishing (most
famously the Radio Times),
VHS and DVD releases (through
2 entertain), spoken word and music audio products, CD-ROMs, videogames,
library footage sales via the BBC
Motion Gallery and its website BBC Motion
Gallery, magazine subscription fulfilment, exhibitions, and
live events such as CBeebies Live.
These commercial activities allow BBC Worldwide to return profits
and dividends to the BBC to re-invest in
public service programming. In 2007/08
BBC Worldwide invested £75.1m in in-house and independent
programmes commissioned by the BBC. However, the BBC has often been
criticised for the amount of money it makes from BBC Worldwide.
Some commercial rivals protest at the advantage the company has
from being associated with and being able to exploit the programme
catalogue and resources of the BBC in order to provide its goods
and services.
Sales, acquisitions and mergers
Prior to the Charter renewal in 2007, there was much speculation
that the BBC might sell off at least some of Worldwide's assets,
such as the magazine publishing arm (the third largest in the UK),
to appease these criticisms and make a large profit from the sale
in the process. However, a review of the BBC's commercial
activities in 2004 concluded that this was not as advantageous as
keeping the business and driving it harder. Instead, some changes
to its remit, focus, structure and governance were made, e.g. that
it would only publish titles in the UK linked to BBC programmes or
key genres. As a result, BBC Worldwide sold
eve magazine
to
Haymarket Group in 2005. In 2006,
the sell-off of certain businesses which were no longer core
continued with the sale of
BBC Books to
publisher
Random House.
In July 2004, it was announced that Worldwide's DVD release
company, BBC Video, which had been releasing BBC programmes on the
format and previously on videotape since the early 1980s, was to be
merged with VCI, a video release company controlled by
Woolworths Group plc. The new company
created,
2 entertain
Ltd, was controlled 60% by Worldwide and 40% by
Woolworths Group plc. This
created the sixth biggest video company in the UK market, and the
largest British-owned brand. Worldwide retained the rights in all
the BBC output released by the new company. As of November 2008,
Woolworths, which came into financial difficulties in the latter
half of that year, confirmed that it was negotiating a deal to sell
the remaining share of the company to Worldwide.
In January
2009 it was announced that Ofcom
had put
forward the recommendation that Channel 4
merge with either the commercial network Five or BBC Worldwide. Channel 4's
preferred option of a partnership with the latter was confirmed by
chief executive
Andy Duncan,
who added: "We're in discussions with BBC Worldwide at the moment
and they're really very exciting."
See also
References
- BBC Worldwide announces sale of eve magazine to
Haymarket BBC Press Office. 11 January 2005
- The Random House Group acquires majority
shareholding in BBC Books Random House Group/BBC Worldwide
Press Office. 22 June 2006
External links
Wikis
Quiz
Map
Misc
Search
