In The Frame October '20

Tom Pammenter Published: 09.11.2020 Industry news

This month's latest news across the industry.

Streaming/Online/Tech

The next oral evidence session for the Digital, Media, Culture and Sports Committee inquiry into the future of public service broadcasting takes place on 3 November. Executives from Amazon and YouTube will give evidence and their views on the UK’s broadcast environment, its trends and future.

Currys PC World has conducted a study into the evolution of TV consumption. One of the key findings is that 15 million UK households now subscribe to at least one SVOD service. Other points of note are: one in four Britons prefer watching SVOD services instead of broadcast TV; men are twice as likely to watch TV in the bathroom than women; the Welsh watch the most broadcast TV, East Midlanders love SVODs and Londoners are the most likely to watch TV on a non-TV device.

DAZN, the global sports streaming service, expands to more than 200 countries and territories from 1 December. The initial monthly price point for new markets will be £1.99 or less.

ITV is to increase its focus on streaming to compete with rivals including Netflix. The public service broadcaster announced that it’s to restructure “to better reflect and serve changing viewing habits”. A new Media and Entertainment Division with two new business units, Broadcast and On-Demand, will be established. The move is expected to lead to job losses at ITV’s linear operation.

ITV’s advertising platform, Planet V, has launched, giving advertisers and agencies control over the planning, purchasing and reporting of campaigns across ITV Hub, the broadcaster’s VOD service.

BBC News

As part of ongoing engagement with charities, support groups and community organisations regarding TV licences for over-75s, BBC representatives have held talks with Age UK and Silver Voices. The BBC introduced a scheme in August offering some over-75 households a free TV licence, more than 700,000 of which have been claimed. More information on licences for the over-75s can be found here.

Masters degrees in directing and producing television entertainment, screenwriting, and producing are among the courses offered as part of a new three-year partnership between the corporation and the National Film and Television School, which runs more behind-the-camera courses than any other film school in the world.

The BBC has secured exclusive rights to broadcast the 2022 Commonwealth Games, taking place across Birmingham and the West Midlands

And finally...

John Whittingdale, the culture minister with responsibility for broadcast policy, has suggested a possible sell-off of Channel 4 and that the channel was struggling financially. The broadcaster, however, later in the month, published its annual report for 2019, saying that it will end 2020 “with a healthy financial surplus to invest”.
A series of live polls has revealed concern that the Covid-19 pandemic could result in the end of post-production in Soho. The polls were conducted during a virtual Broadcast Tech Fest event.
The longest-running arts show on British television, The South Bank Show, returns to free-to-air channel Sky Arts on 22 November.
Sky and Adobe have launched an initiative to improve the media and digital literacy of 30,000 young people across the UK and Ireland. The Edit focuses on low-income areas.
Freeview has started the roll-out of its Accessible TV Guide, available on Channel 555 through Freeview Play devices.
Viewers in the UK of Samsung TV Plus, Samsung's ad-supported video streaming service (AVOD) that comes pre-installed on its smart TVs, can now access the free movie streaming and social platform Filmzie.