The TV battle to be top of the box
BritBox was set up by the BBC and ITV to take on Netflix, but ITV boss says it is impossible to rival US firm
IT WAS the day when TV viewers could talk directly to the people who decide what to put on screen, and it was not long before TV bosses were forced on the defensive.
Consumer group Voice of the Listener and Viewer, which champions public service broadcasting, attracted the Chairman of the BBC and the Chief Executive of ITV to its autumn conference at the Geological Society, in London.
The conference was barely 10 minutes into its stride when ITV boss Dame Carolyn McCall, made a surprising admission about BritBox.
The new subscription streaming service was devised by the BBC and ITV to take on Netflix. But Dame Carolyn admitted it could not hope to rival the American giant as its pockets were too deep.
She told the audience: “They are a global company on onehundred-and-something million subscribers already. Their shareholders are absolutely betting on their future.
“It is impossible to rival that.” Dame Carolyn insisted that the two services would complement each other, with “nothing really that is on Netflix that will be on BritBox and vice versa”.
But she acknowledged that ITV and BBC programmes that were on Netflix would be migrating to BritBox when current contracts expire, meaning that viewers will have to buy monthly subscriptions to both services to continue viewing the full selection.
BritBox was launched earlier this month with a catalogue of recent and archived programmes, some of which had previously been available on the free BBC iPlayer and ITV Hub streaming services.
Those will now be largely restricted to programmes shown in the past few weeks.
Channel Four programmes are expected to join the BritBox lineup next year. The service, which costs £5.99 a month, requires a compatible streaming set-top box or stick in order to watch on a TV.
Both ITV and the BBC had hoped that BritBox – which launched in the US two years ago but whose debut here was delayed by concerns over competition – would counter the dominance of American streaming giants, which include Amazon Prime
Video as well as Netflix. Despite Dame Carolyn’s admission of the impossibility of taking them on, BritBox has succeeded in uniting two British broadcasters who have been rivals since ITV’s launch in 1955 (inset) – though she doubted the new era of co-operation would extend to the commercial channel making its most valuable properties available to the corporation.
“Not likely,” she replied when asked if she would ever make a series with And and Dec for the other side. ITV does, however, make other programmes for the BBC, including new versions of its own formats such as
University Challenge.
Voice of the Listener and Viewer, founded in 1983 by the writer Jocelyn Hay, has a history of fighting broadcasters on controversial decisions, including the closure of ITV’s regional stations and Radio 4’s long wave frequency for Test cricket, and proposals to privatise Radio 1 and Radio 2.
They are a global company...it is impossible to rival that.
Dame Carolyn McCall, ITV’s Chief Executive, talks about Netflix.