BBC Worldwide - History

History

In addition to broadcasting, the BBC has for much of its life also produced additional materials for sale, the profits of which would be returned to the corporation to aide in the financing of these services. The highest profile of these early products was the listings magazine Radio Times, however the net revenue gained from this in 1928 (£93,686, 10s, 1d) only equated to 10% of total BBC income.

Prior to 1979, several BBC departments dealt with the exploitation and sale of BBC brands and programmes. BBC Publications, which produced magazines, books and other supplementary materials, had expanded rapidly in the late 1960s but still had difficulties with finances: in 1974 the division made a loss of £14,000. This was rectified however as the economic situation eased and by 1982 BBC Publications had a trading profit of £4.7 million. BBC Transcription Services licensed BBC Radio material to overseas broadcasters.

The exploit of television programmes was at first handled in 1958 with the establishment of a business manager post. This gradually expanded until the establishment of the Television Promotions (later renamed Television Enterprises) department in 1960 under a general manager. In its first year, the department saw the sale of 550 programmes overseas with a turnover of £234,000, with a further 1,200 programmes sold the following year. Radio programmes were only exploited on the same level with the creation of the Radio Enterprises department in 1965. However, following the retirement of the Radio Enterprises general manager in 1969, the two departments were merged to form the BBC Enterprises department.

In 1979 the department became BBC Enterprises Ltd., a subsidiary company wholly owned by the BBC. By 1982, the division were expanding with divisions responsible for home video (under the brand BBC Video), recorded audio (under the brands BBC Records and BBC Cassettes), film and merchanding. At this point the company had a turnover of £23 million. On 1 April 1986, all commercial activities of the corporation, including BBC Publications, was merged into BBC Enterprises Ltd.

In 1991 BBC World Service Television became the first commercially funded BBC broadcasting operation after the Foreign Office refused to pay for it. BBC Enterprises Ltd was subsequently reorganised in 1995 as BBC Worldwide Ltd. A review of the BBC's commercial activities took place in 2004 and concluded that the sell off of BBC Worldwide's assets was not as advantageous as keeping the business and driving it harder. Instead, some changes to its remit, focus, structure and governance were made, e.g. that it would only publish titles in the UK linked to BBC programmes or key genres.

In 2004, BBC Video merged with VCI to form 2 Entertain, which was part owned by BBC Worldwide; the following year the company sold Eve magazine to Haymarket Group and in 2006 BBC Books was sold to publisher Random House. In 2007, BBC Worldwide purchased a 75% share in travel guide publisher Lonely Planet for £88.1m, later increasing the share to 100% in February 2011.

In January 2009 it was announced that Ofcom had put forward the recommendation that Channel 4 merge with either the commercial network Five or BBC Worldwide. Channel 4's preferred option of a partnership with the latter was confirmed by chief executive Andy Duncan, who added: "We're in discussions with BBC Worldwide at the moment and they're really very exciting." In the same year, the company was awarded the Queen's Award for Enterprise in recognition of the companies growth and success.

In 2012, the company began to reorganise their divisions from a product based system to a location based system, resulting in Jana Bennett leaving the company.