BBC Showcase Goes Digital

LONDON, February 19: BBC
Showcase, the annual market hosted by BBC Worldwide, will go completely digital
this year, with “digibooths” and video on demand.

The new digibooths at BBC
Showcase will offer all buyers a bespoke VOD service, allowing them to give
instant feedback on programming they view and significantly improve sales
analysis at the event. The move to digital is part of a wider global TV sales
strategy at BBC Worldwide to future-proof its content and delivery capabilities
by digitizing its catalogue. The company already boasts more than 5,000 hours
of digitized programming.

During the four-day annual
event, BBC Worldwide generates program sales and brokers international funding
deals for co-productions on behalf of the BBC and independent producers. More
than 550 buyers are expected to attend this year, and will view approximately
1,000 hours of British output.

This year’s highlights
include natural-history programs such as David Attenborough’s Life… series, Life in Cold Blood and the co-production Wild China, which airs this year in the run up to the 2008
Olympics in Beijing. The event will also showcase new comedy titles like Never
Better and Gavin and Stacey. Contemporary drama series Mistresses and Ashes to Ashes will be featured alongside period dramas such as Cranford, Lark Rise to Candleford, Jekyll and Oliver Twist. Science programming available includes Moonshot, which celebrates the 40th anniversary of the
lunar landing, as well as Oceans
and Earth, The Power of the Planet.
Children’s highlights include In the Night Garden and Animalia.

BBC Worldwide has also
been developing its own formats, with the first-ever in-house format, How
Much Is Enough?, which debuted on
GSN in the U.S. in January. Other formats on offer at Showcase this year
include The Weakest Link’s BBC
Two replacement quiz show Brainbox
and BBC Three’s search for the next Kate Moss, Find Me the Face.

BBC Showcase 2008 will be
held at the Brighton Centre from February 24 to 27.

—By Ned Berke