The BBC has appointed Jon Petrie as Director of Comedy. Petrie will lead the BBC’s generator of original scripted comedy responsible for multi-awarding winning comedies including The Young Offenders, Inside No. 9, This Country, Ghosts, Man Like Mobeen, Motherland and In My Skin. Petrie started his career at Talkback Productions, before moving to Roughcut Television […]

The UK government has launched a public consultation on the future ownership of Channel 4, as part of its review of public service broadcasting. The consultation will consider both the ownership and remit of Channel 4. The government says the current strength and variety of the UK’s TV production sector is in part thanks to […]

Channel 4 daytime has commissioned a new quiz show Moneybags from Youngest Media, hosted by Craig Charles, where bag loads of cash will be, literally, up for grabs every afternoon. In this high-stakes quiz that puts mental speed to the test, contestants face a series of questions with the answers on moneybags that pass along […]

Channel 4 and Sky have renewed and expanded their long-term commercial partnership. The broadcasters say that their new multi-year agreement will “extend the strategic relationship, giving both parties more opportunities to collaborate, support commercial growth, and innovate as broadcasting evolves in the future”. The partnership will make even more Channel 4 content available to Sky […]

Channel 4’s Indie Growth Fund has taken a minority stake in the Manchester-based indie Salamanda Media. Salamanda Media, which specialises in factual entertainment, talent-led factual and formats, is run by Sally Evans and Amanda De Freitas, who between them have more than 30 years’ experience in the industry, and a track record in developing and […]

As part of an ongoing strategic review of the UK public service broadcasting system, the UK government will review the ownership model and remit of Channel 4 and consider tightening regulation of SVoD services such as Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime Video. The Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS) says that with a […]

Channel 4 has launched its 2020 Annual Report and gave an interim update on the Future4 transformation strategy, from the organisation’s new National HQ in the Majestic in Leeds. The 2020 Annual Report shows that, despite the background of uncertainty and volatility resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic, Channel 4 delivered a record financial surplus of […]

Krishnan Guru-Murthy has accepted the position of Chair of the albert News Consortium. The group, which formed in January 2021, was set up to support the broadcast and production community specifically engaged in news television. Members of the group currently include: ITN (producers of ITV News, Channel 4 News and 5 News), BBC, ITV, Sky […]

The UK parliament’s Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee is to address the future of commercial PSB Channel 4 following the confirmation that privatisation is an option being considered by the Government. Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden told the Committee in May 2021 that its privatisation was under examination in a review of public service broadcasting. […]

Channel 4 has appointed Mel Bezalel as Commissioning Editor for E4, reporting into Head of Youth and Digital, Karl Warner. Joining from RDF Television, in the new role, Bezalel will be focused on finding, developing and overseeing a range of original, large scale unscripted commissions aimed at 16-34s, as well as further developing the relationship […]