Saturday, 20 Apr 2024

BBC and Discovery set to launch streaming service in 2020

Discovery and the BBC are chucking out the script in a new global streaming venture that will combine its extensive real-life entertainment library with the UK media giant’s natural-history catalog.

The video service, which is expected to cost less than $5 per month, will be 100-percent owned by Discovery, which has reached an exclusive 10-year agreement with BBC Studios for all of its natural history programs in SVOD (streaming video on demand) in territories outside the UK, Ireland and China.

The over-the-top service, set for a 2020 launch, seeks to rival those of Netflix and Amazon, as well as future offerings from Disney and Apple — but will distinguish itself by focusing only on factual genres.

“The others mostly deal with scripted content,” Discovery Chief Executive David Zaslav said in a phone interview. “We’re not in that game.”

Zaslav considers the game Discovery is pursuing as bigger than that.

“We’re documenting the planet at a time everybody’s wondering what’s going on with the planet,” he said. “We’ll be delivering content that’s not only entertaining and educating but also has passion and comes from our hearts.”

Discovery is the global home for the BBC’s “Planet Earth,” “Blue Planet” and the recently acclaimed “Dynasties” series and, under the terms of the deal, the companies will create more factual content for Discovery and co-fund a dedicated development team within BBC Studios.

Those UK productions will add to Discovery’s lineup of such features as “MythBusters,” “Deadliest Catch” and “Unsolved History” — not to mention the popular “Shark Week.”

“This is our largest-ever content sales deal,” said Tony Hall, Director-General of the BBC. “Global subscribers are in for a real treat — the best content on a great new platform.”

The two companies also announced plans to unwind their shared UKTV broadcast business by splitting it up in ways complementary to each co-owner.

Discovery will take ownership of UKTV’s “lifestyle” channels — Good Food, Home and Really — and add them to its UK portfolio of 16 channels, including Discovery Channel, TLC, Animal Planet and Eurosport.

BBC Studios will assume full control of the remaining seven “entertainment” channels, which will continue to operate under the UKTV brand out of UKTV’s offices and BBC Studios.

Discovery acquired its interest in HGTV through its $14.6 billion acquisition of Scripps Networks Interactive in March 2018.

On splitting it up, BBC Studios will pay $225 million to Discovery as both a balancing payment and a way to cover $91 million in debt currently financed by Discovery.

Discovery and the BBC have been partners since 1985, when Discovery Channel started broadcasting many productions from the London-based public-service broadcaster.

The Discovery Channel’s broadcast of BBC-produced “Walking With Dinosaurs” in April 2000 set the all-time US cable ratings record and remains the most-viewed telecast in the channel’s history to date.

Zaslav said the new streaming service will add another “pillar” to Discovery’s over-the-top offerings.

Those have recently grown to include Golf TV — the global but non-US live and on-demand video streaming service launched by Discovery and the PGA Tour in January — and a cycling initiative building on the controlling stake Discovery acquired in Play Sports Group, a leading broadcaster of European cycling events, earlier this year.

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