Simon Cowell is all set to sign a new deal with ITV to stay on ‘X Factor’ until 2013, which would fetch him a whopping 20 million pounds. This would also mean an extra 4million pounds will be put into the series every year. The contract, set to be for at least two or three [...]
Posts Tagged ‘ITV’
Apple TV Could Be Renamed iTV, Feature Apps
August 12th, 2010 |
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Apple TV could be renamed iTV, according to an unnamed source quoted by tech blog Engadget, and feature the ability to run apps. Although Apple Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook once referred to Apple TV as the companys "hobby," the rise of Google TV could goad Apple into devoting more resources to the segment. – Apple TV will soon be renamed iTV, according to the latest
rumors circulating online, and leverage a new iTunes streaming service for
content.
Those
rumors come courtesy of Engadget,
which claims a trusted but unnamed source
in the matter. That source also suggested that, thanks to an
un…
Peter Andre lands £1m ITV deal
July 6th, 2010 |
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Australian singer Peter Andre has signed a 1 million pound deal with ITV to continue his show ‘The Next Chapter’. Andre has signed the deal to continue his spy-on-the-wall show for a third series, before the current series has even ended. Bosses want to turn the 37-year-old singer into the ‘darling of ITV’ and have [...]
Freesat Gets iPlayer And ITV Catchup TV Services Posted By : Paddy Chang
July 6th, 2010 |
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Live Internet TV | Online TV technology allows you to watch over 4,500 HD channels right on your PC.
Christine Bleakley’s ‘£6m deal to join GMTV’s Adrian Chiles’
June 7th, 2010 |
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Rumour has it that Christine Bleakley has parted ways with BBC, to join GMTV with her old sofa partner on The One Show, Adrian Chiles.
She is said to have negotiated a 6million pound, four-year contract directly with ITV’s director of television Peter Fincham. After confirmation from her agent, transfer rumours seem to be true.
“There will [...]
Simon Cowell doesn’t know how to use an iPod!
March 6th, 2010 |
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Simon Cowell has turned X Factor beauties Leona Lewis and Alexandra Burke into stars but can’t listen to their hits on his iPod – because he doesn’t know how to use one.
“I keep getting given iPods and I don’t know how to use them,†the Daily Star quoted Cowell, as saying.
The 50-year-old music [...]
ITV in £25m Friends Reunited sale
August 6th, 2009 |
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ITV has sold Friends Reunited for £25m four years after buying it for £120m.
The buyer is Brightsolid Limited, which is owned by DC Thomson, publisher of comics such as the Beano.
The announcement came with the release of half-year results, which were hit by the worst decline in UK television advertising on record.
ITV made a pre-tax loss of £105m in the period. There was no more information given on the recruitment of a new chief executive to replace Michael Grade.
The £105m loss compares with a £1.5bn loss in the same period of 2008, although last year’s figure was hit by a £1.6bn charge reducing the value of investments made in 2000 and 2004.
ITV’s advertising revenues fell by 15%, which was slightly better than the 17% fall in the overall market.
The broadcaster’s pension fund deficit had ballooned to £538m by 30 June, compared with £178m at the end of 2008.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
In your face
August 6th, 2009 |
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By Zoe Kleinman
Business reporter, BBC News
Remember the days when it seemed as if everyone was on Friends Reunited Childhood sweethearts rekindled old flames, old school chums exchanged news and reunion parties were all the rage.
Then along came sites like Facebook and we all started virtually poking each other instead.
The rise and perceived fall of Friends Reunited is well documented.
The pioneer of social networking enjoyed a meteoric success in the early 2000s and then faltered when competitors in the very marketplace it had created effectively crowded it out.
Or so the story goes. In fact, the Friends Reunited brand has quietly been doing rather well. It boasts 19 million members and its sister site Genes Reunited has 650 million names on its database.
A quick look at ITV’s online portfolio profits for the first six months of this year reveals more good news.
Out of a profits total of £18m, £10m was generated by Itv.com and the "majority" of the remaining £8m came from Friends Reunited, a spokesperson says.
Competition
After the launch of Facebook in 2004, Friends Reunited suddenly found itself being criticised for being too basic by comparison – it lacked any applications such as gaming and voting tools with which to entice returning members.
Friends responded by launching dating and shopping services, as well as the Genes Reunited ancestry tracing service.
And although it may enjoy global popularity, Facebook, the grand dame of social networking, has yet to make any money.
Speaking to the BBC last month, Facebook’s chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg said the company is making money, but it’s advertising revenue is being used to fund growth.
It does not expect to become profitable before 2010.
Humble beginnings
Friends Reunited got off to a humble start in a kitchen in Barnet, North London.
Co-founder Julie Pankhurst had the idea in 1999 when she was pregnant and curious about which of her old school friends were also starting families.
Her husband Steve and business partner Jason Porter were looking for internet-related business ideas and decided to develop something which would enable people to get back in touch with each other.
The result – Friends Reunited – launched in July 2000. Its original revenue model was subscription-based; members could view other members’ profiles for free but a £7 annual fee was required to make contact.
However, following the proliferation of other social networking sites which were all free to use, it dropped its subscription charge in May 2008 and switched to an advertising model.
‘Not embarrassed’
This morning, ITV’s chief operating officer John Cresswell told the BBC that he is not embarrassed by the media organisation’s decision to sell the website at a fraction of the original £175m price.
"It was bought four or five years ago by the then management team, as the first move to give ITV some online presence," he said.
"This current management believes that the future for online for ITV is about video, and we’re investing our money into itv.com… that’s where we think the strategic direction of the business should go. Friends (Reunited) wasn’t important and so we decided to sell it."
ITV may be going in a different direction, but if Friends Reunited continues to make profits at its current rate, its new owners Brightsolid may have snapped up a bit of a bargain after paying £25m for it.
"I don’t think we overpaid, but don’t think we underpaid either," says Brightsolid’s chief executive Chris van der Kuyl.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Simon Cowell wants to sign Madonna as ‘The X Factor’ contestants’ mentor
August 3rd, 2009 |
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Simon Cowell is reportedly desperate to sign Queen of Pop Madonna to guide ‘The X Factor’ contestants as a guest mentor.
He is said to have asked show bosses to allocate some extra cash in their budget to fund a one-off deal with the Material Girl.
“Simon is the most powerful man in TV these days [...]
ITV set to sell Friends Reunited at £160m loss
July 26th, 2009 |
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• Social networking site bought by ITV for £175m
• Peter Dubens understood to be in talks over £15m offer
Internet entrepreneur Peter Dubens has emerged as a potential bidder for Friends Reunited, offering to end ITV’s disastrous experiment with online social networking at a massive 90% discount to what the broadcaster paid for the website four years ago.
ITV put Friends Reunited up for sale in February as the drop in online advertising revenues forced the company to dramatically writedown the value of a business that had cost it £175m.
Analysts believe Friends Reunited is worth about £20m to £40m, but private equity firm Oakley Capital is understood to have offered just £15m. Oakley is backed by Dubens, who also has connections through another investment vehicle with Michael Birch, the founder of rival networking site Bebo.
Despite speculation over the weekend that Oakley is in exclusive talks over a deal, ITV insiders maintain that several other parties are also interested and the price being suggested is very much at the bottom end of the range being discussed. An ITV spokeswoman refused to comment.
The broadcaster snapped up Friends Reunited for an initial £120m in cash, just before Christmas 2005, but it soon lost ground to newer rivals such as Facebook, MySpace, Bebo and more recently Twitter. While a move into geneology, allowing people to trace their family trees, saw the company increase repeat traffic to its websites, revenues have remained small.
In April last year ITV launched a last-ditch attempt to get back into the game, dumping Friends Reunited’s so-called “pay wall” in favour of a free model. At the time it claimed 19 million people had registered since its launch in 2000, with 13 million of those using the site at least once in any 18-month period. That usage, however, is still paltry when compared with other sites such as Facebook.
Serial entrepreneur Peter Dubens snapped up a number of small internet service providers on the cheap when the dotcom bubble burst, including Homecall, set up by former Phones4U owner John Caudwell, and Bulldog, the residential broadband provider jettisoned by Cable & Wireless, and rolled them into his Pipex business. In 2007 he sold Pipex to Tiscali for £210m, now part of Carphone Warehouse’s TalkTalk operation.
More recently Dubens, who was not available for comment, has become involved in a new digital media fund set up by Michael Birch, who became a multimillionaire when he sold his teenage social networking site Bebo to AOL.
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Arqiva to buy Kangaroo technology
July 23rd, 2009 |
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Broadcast transmission company aims to do content deals after buying technology behind defunct broadband TV venture
Arqiva, the broadcast transmission company, has confirmed it is to buy the technology behind the defunct broadband TV venture Project Kangaroo to launch a video-on-demand service of its own.
The company is now looking to do deals with broadcasters and other content providers to supply the video material that will be offered online to consumers.
Arqiva said the new video-on-demand service would appear in the coming months and feature “both free-to-air and pay content propositions”. It is not yet clear whether it would introduce a subscription or pay-per-view model or both.
“The platform will aim to host top-end quality content from leading broadcasters and independent content providers to provide a broad range of user experiences to its audiences,” Arqiva said.
Arqiva added that it would complete the acquisition of Kangaroo’s “hardware and software technology, and related intellectual property” within a few weeks.
Kangaroo’s founding partners BBC Worldwide, ITV and Channel 4 had to abandon the project following more than a year of development after it was blocked by the Competition Commission in February.
The move will put Arqiva, which owns the UK terrestrial TV and radio transmitter network but is neither a broadcaster nor a content producer, in a consumer-facing relationship for the first time.
Arqiva is unlikely to keep the Kangaroo brand or use its own corporate name for the new venture.
The company owns two of the six Freeview multiplexes, via which bundles of digital terrestrial TV channels are broadcast, and has been seen as a potential bidder for a third, the SDN business that has been put up for sale by ITV.
Arqiva became the sole owner of the national digital radio multiplex Digital One yesterday, taking over the majority stake that was owned by Global Radio, the owner of Classic FM and Capital Radio.
The Winchester-based company owns the UK’s 1,100 TV and radio masts and also offers services to satellite groups and mobile operators.
“We believe that online video-on-demand is an exciting and complementary development, and a natural extension to our traditional broadcast business,” said Steve Holebrook, the managing director for terrestrial broadcast at Arqiva.
Arqiva put no price on today’s acquisition but it is likely to be a fraction of the £30m-plus that Project Kangaroo cost its partners.
Last week BBC Worldwide revealed that Kangaroo had cost it £9.1m, while ITV estimated that its costs relating to the project would ultimately be £12m.
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Coronation Street leaves Wednesdays
July 8th, 2009 |
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Emmerdale double-bill joins Coronation Street on Thursdays and The Bill made ‘edgier’ in major ITV1 schedule overhaul
ITV is to break with nearly 50 years of broadcasting tradition and shift Coronation Street from Wednesday to Thursday night as part of a major overhaul of its popular drama schedule.
Coronation Street, which has been broadcast on Wednesday night since ITV’s flagship soap launched in December 1960, will move later this month, MediaGuardian.co.uk can reveal.
The broadcaster wants to turn Thursday night into its popular drama powerhouse, with a schedule shakeup in which The Bill will move to a new 9pm slot – after two episodes of Emmerdale and one Coronation Street. Coronation Street will shift to Thursdays at 8.30pm as part of the scheduling reshuffle.
Emmerdale’s hour-long Tuesday episode will be cut by half, with an extra 30-minute instalment of the Yorkshire-based soap scheduled on Thursdays at 8pm. A 30-minute Emmerdale episode already runs at 7pm on Thursdays.
The Bill, which is shrinking from two episodes a week to one and being given a makeover to make it edgier for its new post-watershed slot, will follow Coronation Street on Thursdays. Currently, the Thursday night schedule has The Bill in the 8pm hour.
These changes, which begin from the week commencing 20 July, are being implemented to clear Wednesday nights – where Coronation Street is at 7.30pm and The Bill at 8pm – to make way for more live football.
ITV’s new contract for the Uefa Champions League, which starts from the new season in August and runs until 2012, will see ITV1 broadcasting its pick of Wednesday evening matches rather than Tuesdays fixtures, as had been the case. Live coverage of England internationals and FA Cup replays are also shown on ITV1 on Wednesdays.
Moving Emmerdale out of the 7.30pm slot on Tuesdays will also mean it no longer clashes with EastEnders on BBC1, giving soap fans a clear run to watch both. The new-look ITV1 Thursday night schedule allows viewers to switch to EastEnders at 7.30pm.
An ITV spokesman said: “Coronation Street will make a move from Wednesday to Thursday nights on ITV1 from 23 July as part of a change to the schedule to reflect ITV’s contracts for the Champions League, FA Cup and England internationals, which will see ITV1′s live football broadcast on Wednesday evenings.
“In addition, two separate episodes of Emmerdale will be broadcast on Thursdays from the same date. We’re delighted that Thursday evenings on ITV1 will be a great showcase for soap from Weatherfield and the Woolpack.”
The revamped Bill, which is being repositioned as a post-watershed drama for the first time in its 25-year history, will begin its run in its new 9pm slot on Thursdays from 23 July with a double episode special, concluding the following night.
Changes to the continuing series include high definition filming with a musical score, new title credits and theme music.
“We haven’t sought to totally reinvent The Bill, but we have wanted to create a more immersive experience for our viewers,” said the show’s executive producer, Johnathan Young.
“We’re digging deeper into characters to tell stronger and more challenging stories which really examine the true causes and effects of crime. The later timeslot allows us to produce darker, grittier and more hard-hitting drama, through the eyes of our existing characters. The heart of the show will remain the same, but it will look very fresh.”
Sergeant Callum Stone (played by Sam Callis) and PC Ben Gayle (Micah Balfour) will be the first characters to tread the streets of Sun Hill in the new 9pm timeslot, leading the action into the first big storyline, titled Live by the Sword, which features a 15-year-old boy who is critically injured following a knife attack on an estate.
Viewers will get the first taste of the new-look show through a national ITV marketing campaign, including billboard posters and on-air trails.
The new-look ITV1 schedule
Tuesday 7 July/Tuesday 21 July (subject to change)
7pm: Emmerdale/Emmerdale
7.30pm: Emmerdale/You’ve Been Framed! (usually factual series)
8pm: Homes From Hell/Send in the Dogs (usually factual series or entertainment)
9pm: Ladette to Lady/Car Crime UK (usually factual, entertainment or drama)
Wednesday 8 July/Wednesday 22 July
7pm: Emmerdale/Emmerdale
7.30pm: Coronation Street v Grime Fighters or football
8pm: The Bill/new Midsomer Murders or football or drama/movie/factual
9pm: Trial and Retribution/new Midsomer Murders
Thursday 9 July/Thursday 23 July
7pm: Emmerdale/Emmerdale
7.30pm: Countrywise/Countrywise
8pm: The Bill/Emmerdale
8.30pm: The Bill/Coronation Street
9pm: Trial and Retribution/The Bill
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guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds