{"id":550091,"date":"2026-07-15T00:42:19","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T00:42:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/550091\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T00:42:19","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T00:42:19","slug":"bbc-studios-ceo-interview-on-doctor-who-mergers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/550091\/","title":{"rendered":"BBC Studios CEO Interview On ‘Doctor Who,’ Mergers"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tTom Fussell<\/a>, the head\u00a0of BBC<\/a> Commercial, the commercial arm of the U.K. public broadcaster that mainly consists of\u00a0BBC Studios, of which he serves as CEO, is upbeat.<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter all, BBC Commercial, which is mostly driven by BBC Studios, just reported improved<\/a> full fiscal-year earnings and steady record revenue earlier on Tuesday, helped by the continued success of animated hit franchise\u00a0<\/a>Bluey<\/a> and other factors.<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter the financial update, Fussell talked to\u00a0The Hollywood Reporter\u00a0about key growth drivers and challenges, recent mega-mergers, such as Paramount\u2019s deal for Warner Bros. Discovery and the just-unveiled acquisition of ITV\u2019s network and streaming assets by Comcast\u2019s Sky.<\/p>\n

\n\tAmong the other topics he addressed are the benefits that BBC Studios has seen from using the power of YouTube,\u00a0the opportunities in vertical content, his take on the company\u2019s M&A opportunities, the ongoing success of Bluey and the upcoming The Bluey Movie, the future of\u00a0Doctor Who and the growth of streaming services BritBox International<\/a> and the documentary-centric BBC Select, part of BBC Studios\u2019 Global Media & Streaming unit. The company\u00a0acquired full control<\/a>\u00a0of BritBox International in 2024. Read Fussell\u2019s thoughts and insights below.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn unveiling the annual results for BBC Commercial, your team highlighted growth in key revenue streams, but also declines elsewhere. Where is the business facing its key challenges and upside?<\/p>\n

\n\tOverall, it\u2019s stable revenue, with significant growth over the five to six years since I\u2019ve been doing this, and profits were up 17 percent. The growth has come from DTC, including from BritBox in North America and BBC Select in North America. BritBox was growing by about 20 percent, the other by 60 percent. BBC Select now is the USA\u2019s third-largest documentary streamer, and we\u2019re going to heavily invest in both of those businesses. <\/p>\n

The content studio had relatively flat revenue, but the margin has gone up significantly because of consumer products. Then you\u2019ve got the sectors where the market is under pressure \u2013 areas that are subject to advertising issues or linear decline, pay renewals in those legacy businesses will be going the other way. They\u2019re still high-margin for us. They are still strategically important, but we\u2019re not immune from the market [challenges]. We\u2019re having to lean into operating cost savings. <\/p>\n

\n\tHow do you feel about your content pipeline?<\/p>\n

\n\tWhen I look at the content side itself, there is such a strong pipeline in the year we\u2019ve got coming up. We have the premiere of Blue Planet III, with the world\u2019s most loved and respected centenarian [Richard Attenborough] narrating it for us.<\/p>\n

\n\tThen we\u2019ve got Sid Gentle Films doing Honey, a prequel to Killing Eve, for the BBC. We\u2019ve got Clerkenwell [Films] that has just done Alice and Steve<\/a> on the back of Baby Reindeer for Disney. They\u2019re doing a Channel Four thriller, partly in the Welsh language, about rock climbing, [called Deadpoint]. I\u2019m not kidding. We showed it to our board, and everyone was holding on with their fingernails. We also got Lookout Point doing Pride and Prejudice for Netflix. We can see from the success on the BBC and on BritBox that The Other Bennett Sister<\/a> has had how those sorts of shows can travel around the world. So we\u2019ve got a lot coming through.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd tomorrow night after the World Cup semifinal, Fox launches Nation\u2019s Dumbest in the States with Jack Whitehall presenting. <\/p>\n

\n\tWhat can you share about BritBox North America subscriber numbers or color?<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the last year, we launched another tier called Premier, which is significantly more expensive and you get early access to programming. So this distorts things \u2013 the sub numbers don\u2019t really tell the story. We\u2019re also on a number of different platforms, so the subs don\u2019t tell the story. The revenues are growing 20 percent; the profits are well ahead of where we thought they would be when we bought the business. Our mandate is to grow long-term and sustainably. <\/p>\n

\n\tWe are committed to something called returns to the BBC. When I started, we committed to reaching \u00a31.5 billion ($2.0 billion) over five years. We got one more year to go, and we\u2019ve already done \u00a31.4 billion. So we\u2019re going to beat that number, and our mandate is to keep growing that. BritBox will be one of the big drivers. So we will make sure that it has more British programming. It will help British producers. We also help shows that otherwise wouldn\u2019t get made, export them to the U.S. and help them in distribution around the world. BritBox is a really vital asset for the BBC, but also for the U.K. creative sector, which is under real pressure.<\/p>\n

\n\tTell me more about how the BritBox Premier tier has trended.<\/p>\n

\n\tLike in many businesses, once business models settle down, you don\u2019t really want to be in the middle. So we are seeing some people go with more expensive tiers, and some people going with very low-priced tiers that are ad-funded. BritBox is in a crowded market. It\u2019s a specialist niche service that people really want to have. And its fans love what we give them. So our job really is to make sure the fans are getting served with exactly what they want when they want it. The same [goes for] BBC Select. British history, world history works really well.<\/p>\n

\n\tSelect and BritBox both have got room to grow. At BritBox, you\u2019ve got huge breadth. A Woman of Substance, a Channel 4 show, is in the top 10 shows on Amazon Prime Video channels in the U.S. at the moment. That is up against huge American shows, so BritBox really cuts through. <\/p>\n

\n\tYou mentioned the \u00a31.5 billion target for returns to the BBC and how you\u2019ll exceed that. You have also set the goal of doubling the business of BBC Commercial over several years by 2027\/2028. How\u2019s that looking? <\/p>\n

It\u2019s still our ambition. The mandate we have from our shareholders is to keep growing long-term. So every now and then, what we have to do is reinvest and double again. What I tell our teams is that once we get access to capital, which will be part of the new BBC charter, our ambition should be to take it to 2027\/2028, where we double, and then double it again. So we keep going for the long term. We are investing in commercial news, investing in BritBox and Select, because we know that will pay off in future years. We are investing in the licensee team for Bluey, so that when the movie comes out in August 2027, we\u2019re really in a good place to keep growing. <\/p>\n

\n\tWith investments in growth areas, where do you find cost savings that helped the profitability in your latest fiscal year?<\/p>\n

\n\tWe\u2019re a growing business. So what we\u2019ve been doing and talking to our teams about, and it\u2019s tough messages for them, is that there are certain businesses in structural decline where we have to be more efficient and we have to cut. There, we\u2019ve been cutting programming costs and marketing, as well as overheads, and we have been doing that since this time last year. In the year we\u2019re in now, we\u2019re having to go further because we can see the market forces demanding that. And if we don\u2019t do it ourselves to help ourselves, the market will do it to us, and that\u2019ll be really painful and disruptive. So, we\u2019re in the middle right now of making things more efficient, but we have to do it with [an eye on] our long-term mandate.<\/p>\n

\n\t[Among things that have been affected by cost reductions are] some of the support services around us, technological changes \u2013 AI means that you should be able to do certain things cheaper. We have lots of office space, so maybe we\u2019re going to have to contract some of those things globally, and we\u2019ll look at some of the contracts we\u2019ve got with other people. We want to put as much value as we possibly can into making sure we\u2019ve got the best products, the best marketing, the best content. That is where we want to invest. <\/p>\n

\n\tYou mentioned market challenges in more traditional parts of the business. We have seen many big companies looking to tackle them through mega-mergers, from Paramount buying Warner Bros. Discovery to the Sky deal for parts of ITV<\/a>. Do you feel the appetite to buy more production companies or do other M&A, and what do other industry deals mean for BBC Commercial?<\/p>\n

\n\tBuying production companies in the U.K. is probably not in our top 10 of things that we\u2019re looking at. Setting up new labels in the U.K. with talent who may be coming out of some of these mega-mergers, that\u2019s something we\u2019d look at. <\/p>\n

\n\tOn the whole, we\u2019ve been putting our money in the past into development teams on the content studio side. Inorganically, we paid \u00a3255 million for the other half of BritBox, and we paid \u00a3173 million pounds for the other half of UKTV. So we\u2019re in the market to do those deals, but we need capital to do them.<\/p>\n

\n\tMy view on these mega-mergers is that they mean we\u2019re going to have fewer customers, which is troubling. But it may lead to stronger customers, which is good news. So let\u2019s see how that works. As far as competitors to us: Look, we are Britain\u2019s global content studio. We\u2019re the most respected, most renowned of Britain\u2019s content studios. We\u2019re the only producer with four out of the top 10 on IMDb. My customers, when I speak to them, want to know who\u2019s making the program, and they\u2019re buying the program. They\u2019re not buying the mega-super-business that comes through the front door. It\u2019s about what\u2019s the title and who\u2019s making it? And we\u2019ve got some of the best in the business, and I\u2019m incredibly proud of that. <\/p>\n

\n\tWhat we\u2019re really working on is our U.S. business that is growing really well in unscripted under Ryan O\u2019Dowd. Dancing With the Stars had a record finale, so you know about that. The 1% Club has done really well on Fox, and Nation\u2019s Dumbest is launching with Jack Whitehall tomorrow night on Fox. We\u2019ve got a new primetime commission called Dancing With the Stars:\u00a0The Next Pro with the winner of last year\u2019s Dancing With the Stars, Robert Irwin, which is a new IP for Disney later this year. So we\u2019re really thrilled by the growth we\u2019re seeing in that market.<\/p>\n

\n\tBBC content has done really well on YouTube, and you have described it as a platform that can be additive. Any other digital moves that you are making or seeing as key opportunities, say in the vertical content space?<\/p>\n

\n\tI\u2019m glad you asked about this. Vertical video is now a $100 billion and growing business. That\u2019s broadly double YouTube\u2019s own revenue and double Netflix\u2019s revenue. I\u2019m really proud of the work that our team has been doing here, and it\u2019s not just Bluey. We\u2019ve got Top Gear and all sorts of big archive channels doing it, and our viewership there is more than any other U.K. broadcaster and most global SVODs as far as we can see. <\/p>\n

\n\tNow what we\u2019re doing is boosting the capabilities in the advertising sales space. We\u2019ve got a really good North American advertising sales team, and we\u2019ve got some people joining around the rest of the world. With brand partnerships, we can really start monetizing these things. We\u2019ve grown the traffic, we\u2019ve grown the share. Now we\u2019ll start making some more money with our partners, and I think it\u2019s going to be a really big growth area for us \u2013 not just on traditional long-form YouTube, but also short-form YouTube and short-form on Reels and other vertical channels. <\/p>\n

\n\tThe economics are more challenged on some of the vertical video things at the moment. But I don\u2019t think they\u2019ll always stay that way. It\u2019s something where we see growth. FAST is another area where we\u2019re seeing growth. We\u2019ve got over 300 FAST channels now around the world, so it\u2019s just a huge growth area. <\/p>\n

We have a very rich archive, a very rich amount of IP, but more so, [content] people come to us on the back of what we\u2019re doing with Bluey and beyond. They say, \u201cCan you represent us and be our operator?\u201d And that\u2019s a big growth area for us. We are Britain\u2019s global content studio. We\u2019re the home of British streaming. But we also have a brand IP powerhouse, and that\u2019s the area that I really want to grow.<\/p>\n

\n\tHow about a potential move into microdrama production?<\/p>\n

\n\tWe are very focused on where the market is going, and then building our capabilities to go there. Vertical dramas are not one of our massive priorities at the moment, but there are other aspects of creating new IP with the content creators. Karl Warner [who was hired by BBC Studios Productions in 2024 from his role as Channel 4\u2019s head of youth and digital to establish and lead a new creative unit within its Global Entertainment business that targets premium long-form and digital formats] is relocating to Los Angeles next month. He\u2019ll help our development teams take more development around the world, but also work with content creators using our IP and their IP to create new shows. That\u2019s an area we want to invest in. <\/p>\n

\n\tHow about AI as an investment area?<\/p>\n

\n\tWe\u2019ve got an AI label under [BBC Studios Productions CEO] Zai Bennett<\/a>, run by Alice Taylor, who has come from Disney. We\u2019re testing and learning and trying different things there. It\u2019s quite exciting.<\/p>\n

\n\tDoctor Who is in a rework stage, and you have decided to put the show out to a competitive tender<\/a>, meaning production companies can bid for it. How do you feel about this franchise\u2019s future?<\/p>\n

\n\tWe\u2019re really energized by entering into that tender process with a view to [having one of our labels] winning it. We remain the distributor. We remain the licensor of the consumer products. We believe in Doctor Who. We\u2019ve helped make it for over 60 years. We want to make it for another 60. <\/p>\n

\n\tHow has the launch of the BBC news paywall in the U.S. and beyond worked out?<\/p>\n

\n\tWe were very cautious because it\u2019s the BBC [and its brand]. We\u2019ve then become braver from December onwards, and it\u2019s really surprised us. It is the world\u2019s largest English-language news website, and we are finding that when people are going over the paywall and subscribing, they are loving what they\u2019re getting. The World Cup has been a big driver for us as well in terms of viewership. When we\u2019re talking about things we\u2019re investing in now, that\u2019s one of them. We just turned on the paywall in Canada last month, and it\u2019s been a year<\/a> since the paywall first went up, and it\u2019s exactly where we wanted it to be.<\/p>\n

\n\tThere\u2019s always talk about streamers consolidating and\/or bundling. What\u2019s been your bundling approach?<\/p>\n

\n\tWe have already done bundles with some U.S. streamers as a way of exposing our content to more people and attracting more subscribers. We\u2019re in conversations with people continually to do that. We have done some successful ones, such as with Starz. We\u2019ve windowed some content on HBO in the States, too. So when it works for us, we\u2019ll do it, with our partners. We do the same with Select. Once you subscribe to BBC.com, you also get access to 1,600 hours of documentaries and podcasts through Select. So that\u2019s working. We\u2019ll look at BritBox and BBC Select bundles, which we\u2019ll do too. We\u2019ve got to look at these opportunities of exposing our content and our brands to other people. When they come to us, they really do like it because we\u2019re putting fans first.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tom Fussell, the head\u00a0of BBC Commercial, the commercial arm of the U.K. public broadcaster that mainly consists of\u00a0BBC…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":550092,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[1578,14507,93,61,1042,60,233011,282],"class_list":["post-550091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-bbc","tag-bluey","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-international","tag-ireland","tag-tom-fussell","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/550091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=550091"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/550091\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/550092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=550091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=550091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=550091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}