BBC Sets Out Plans for Boosting Commercial Income

The BBC has set out its strategy for boosting its commercial income, including moving BBC Children’s Production and BBC Global News into BBC Studios.

“We are actively building commercial income with ambitious commercial plans for high-quality programs, vital funding and international audiences,” said Director-General Tim Davie. “The BBC’s commercial activity will become even more important in future as we expand commercial disciplines to new areas, such as children’s production, and, despite a challenging market, seek to achieve the highest possible return from all our assets. This enhances value for license fee payers and boosts the wider creative economy.”

BBC Studios is on track to meet its five-year returns commitment of £1.2 billion by 2021-22, an 18 percent increase on the previous five-year period. BBC Studios has now set a goal of boosting financial returns by 30 percent to the new target of £1.5 billion in the five years from 2022/23.

Expanding the BBC Studios commercial model, BBC Children’s Production will move to BBC Studios from April 2022, allowing it to produce for third-party outlets. “Moving children’s production into BBC Studios will safeguard our specialism within a producer of scale, enabling them to continue to make world-class public-service content for our U.K. audiences, and increasing their potential of taking British children’s content to the wider global market,” said Patricia Hidalgo Reina, director of BBC Children’s & Education.

In addition, BBC Studios is taking on commercial management of BBC Global News, while editorial control of the BBC World News channel will move to the public-service news operation.

Driving direct-to-consumer revenues is also a key focus at BBC Studios, including further expansion of the BritBox International joint venture and the new SVOD service BBC Select.