BBC Worldwide and Veronis Suhler BBC Worldwide has announced its intention to form a joint venture arrangement with leading independent merchant bank, Veronis Suhler, with funding to make acquisitions in the American markets. The partnership will build a major publishing- based consumer media company across our key brands in factual, children’s, music and lifestyle genres. BBC Worldwide and Granada We joined forces with Granada Media in the United States, forming GBTV in Los Angeles to develop, reformat and produce American versions of comedies and drama series inspired by UK originals. BBC Worldwide and Alliance Atlantis BBC Worldwide and Canada’s largest film and TV producer and distributor, Alliance Atlantis, announced a joint venture this year (see On screens around the world ). Our existing joint ventures with Discovery and Flextech are covered on On screens around the world. Globally, programme licensing agreements with our JVs provide BBC Worldwide with an increasing income stream. We also benefit from an equity share in the joint venture channels and, once they reach break even, a share of the profits. There is no financial risk involved for the UK licence payer. Co-production partners Co-productions are an essential means of developing ambitious creative programming. Discovery continues to be our main partner for factual programmes, co-funding key series like Walking with Dinosaurs and Predators. Wives & Daughters and Madame Bovary are just two of the drama programmes produced in collaboration with BBC America and America’s PBS Network via WGBH Boston. The US-based BBC Sales Company ensures that there is more co-production revenue – a total of US$21 million – than all the other UK broadcasters put together. On-screen talent Our payments to UK talent, including actors, musicians, writers and independent producers continued to increase. We continue to improve our information systems, so that talent, agents and independent producers receive regular updates and financial statements about their projects.

The independent sector BBC Worldwide has been strengthening its ties with the independent production sector. Significant improvements have been made in communications, project handling and reporting systems employed with ‘indies’. Procedural changes within the BBC have removed a number of disincentives which might previously have prevented indies from appointing BBC Worldwide as their distribution agent in its own right. Indeed, BBC Worldwide now acts for a number of indies on non-BBC programmes as well as BBC programmes. BBC Worldwide is now as effective in winning rights from independents as from in-house BBC departments (measured as a proportion of rights won to those lost, from the rights made available to us). We have developed highly flexible portfolios of rights to suit individual products, sharing rights on winning products such as Bob the Builder and S Club 7.