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BBC Worldwide, the commercial arm of Britain’s public broadcaster, unveiled a three-pronged plan to expand globally by boosting spending on TV content, strengthening its online site and launching three new channel brands.
Tim Davie, who took the helm in April, said BBC Worldwide had too many different websites and digital propositions, stating there needed to be ‘a greater focus and scale’ to compete with global rivals, such Hulu, Netflix and Amazon, owner of LoveFilm.
Mr Davie outlined plans to increase spending on content by 30 million pounds (BD18 million) a year to about 200 million pounds (BD122 million), announcing a new drama series, Intruders, from the writer of The X-Files.
The eight-episode original series is based on Michael Marshall Smith’s 2007 novel The Intruders. Glen Morgan (The X-Files, Those Who Kill) is the writer and executive producer on the series that’s about a secret society devoted to chasing immortality by seeking refuge in the bodies of others. Production is set to begin in early spring 2014.
He said the launch of three new channel brands focused on natural history, drama and ‘male audiences’ would help promote BBC content to international audiences in different formats from standalone TV channels to online offerings.
One of these new channels, BBC First, will launch first in Australia on the pay-TV platform next August.
The third prong of the strategy involved scrapping a global iPlayer app launched in 2011 and strengthening international online site BBC.com to help the broadcaster meet its target to double its global reach to 500 million people by 2022.
BBC Worldwide’s increased ambitions come as the BBC faces criticism over whether it is giving value to the British public after paying large severance packages to departing managers and scrapping a muliti-million pound digital media project.
Mr Davie said the new investments would enable BBC Worldwide to grow internationally via its own services and third party sales, and raise more revenue.
“This will result in greater access by audiences to BBC and British content and sustainable cash flows back to the BBC,” he said in a statement.
BBC Worldwide posted sales of about 1.1 billion pounds in 2012/013 and returned 156 million pounds to the public service broadcaster that is funded largely by licence fees paid by all British households with a television.
Last week, Tony Hall, director general of the BBC, the world’s largest state-funded broadcaster, said the organisation had to cut costs by 20 per cent by 2017 but also needed to find an additional 100 million pounds a year in savings to invest in the future.
Mr Davie said the three-pronged plan for BBC Worldwide was an effort to make the BBC truly global.
Analysts said it made sense to simplify the way BBC Worldwide reached its audience by focusing on BBC.com.
“It all seems to make sense but there are underlying questions about whether BBC Worldwide should be investing in its own productions or seeking to return the maximum possible amount to licence fee payers,” said Steve Hewlett, a media analyst and former executive with broadcaster ITV.
