BBC Studios, the commercial arm of the BBC, hit £2.09 billion in sales in 2022/23. The corporation made £3 million in advertising, according to its annual report, tempered by a “volatile advertising sector” and “increased inflationary pressures.”
The report noted that the licence fee freeze has resulted in estimated £400 million loss of income over the remainder of the public service broadcaster’s (PSB) Charter, which runs until 2027/28. Nevertheless, commercial revenues were up 23 percent YoY, largely driven by content sales.
The broadcaster also highlighted the increased market share of UKTV, which is wholly owned by BBC Studios. The subsidiary grew its share of the commercial TV audience from 8.52 percent in 2021 to 8.70 percent in 2022. Views on its streaming service UKTV Play were also up 27 percent, according to the report.
Meanwhile BritBox International, a joint venture (JV) between BBC Studios and ITV, increased its subscriber base by 15 percent, reaching three million subs across eight international markets, including the US, Canada, Australia, South Africa and Nordics.
In total the BBC made £12 million from its JVs, where the BBC controls 50 percent of the business or less, including BritBox and BBC America. “2022 was a challenging year for all major content platforms in the US, but BBC America continued to deliver strong revenue and cash,” said the report.
The BBC also mentioned free ad-support streaming TV (FAST) channels, noting that BBC Studios offers 12 FAST channels in North America and 10 in EMEA, across Samsung TV Plus, Roku, Amazon Freevee and Rakuten.
Doubling up
The PSB identified boosting commercial income as a top priority, behind impartiality and trust, providing outstanding content, and offering audiences more value online. “This is central to our strategy for the years ahead as we seek to secure the investment and the partners to make the best possible programmes in a highly competitive market, while generating maximum financial returns for licence fee payers,” said BBC Director-General Tim Davie.
And the organisation offered optimism for the year ahead, thanks to “a strong balance sheet, an exciting, healthy pipeline for its global Content Studio and multi-year content deals.” BBC Studios plans to double the size of its business by 2028, pointing to content partnerships as a future growth path, such as its deal with Disney+ that licences its hit shows (Doctor Who and Bluey) to the streaming service.
The report additionally notes that overall broadcast TV viewing in the UK has been in decline since 2013/14. But since measurement body BARB has extended its remit to track streaming and video sharing services, results have shown the broadcasters to receive the largest viewing share in the UK. “In particular, the UK public continues to consume more hours of BBC TV content than any other provider, including more than Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime combined,” said the report.
But this does not apply to younger viewers, with under-25s spending around 50 percent of their viewing time with video sharing platforms, such as YouTube and TikTok. And the report notes that more under-25s watch SVOD services on average per week (62 percent) than broadcast TV (58 percent).
