ITV Digital applies for administration

Charles Slane

Here's a big story -

http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,7493,672358,00.html

The gist is -

"Granada and Carlton are preparing to shut down ITV Digital within 10 days, according to senior sources.

The crisis-hit TV venture, which has cost its owners £800m so far, will close unless the Football League performs a remarkable about-turn and accepts a £130m cut in TV money.

It is understood lawyers are working through the procedure of winding down the venture, and the plug will be pulled after the Easter break."

A cautionary tale for anyone interested in starting Digital Terrestrial in Ireland.

So what went wrong ? Is it all down to Carlton/Granada's incompetence ?

And what will happen if ITV Digital closes ? What will happen to all those STBs ?

DMC

Its a dead duck.

I was actually posting on the sports boards, but I dont mind repeating myself here....

It appears to be getting very messy at the moment, ITV is considering closing ITV Digital rather than pay the Football League and honour the contract that they signed.

But I do fear for the league in general. These chairmen are known for their arrogance, and they will not accept for less. In fairness to them, using a madman anaolgy, would you go back to an auctioneer looking to pay less after you negiociate a deal to buy the house?

In my view, its Granada and Carlton's fault for a having a bad business model . ITV Sport Channel is only available on NTL cable and ITV Digital, and crucially, not on Sky Digital. Some games got less that 1,000 viewers. Most folk have already subscribed to Sky Sports, would they be willing to shell out more bucks for Football League games? I doubt it.

I also made a comment on 5 Live last night (no less ) ITV has always had a bad name when covering football. When was the last time someone raved about ITV's coverage? Its always "The BBC's Match of the Day is excellent and Sky's Premiership coverage is superb."

The Gravy Train has stopped, time to get off.....

I saw a newsnight report last night where this was discussed in detail.
Chernobyl has a new signiture quoting Tony Ball,commenting on ITV digital management.
And it is right they couldn't run a tap nor mind anything else.
I think GB was not a perfect testing ground for the DTT concept.
It was strangled from the start by having such low transmitter power so as not to interfere with the hundreds of analogue tx's there.
It therefore hadn't a hope of competing with Sky due to lack of spectrum and the fact that most had to put up the type of aerials we are used to here to, get it-something people in Britain would not do that.
The bad reception gave it a bad name and that mud stuck.
Couple that with the population profile of the UK, in that Cable services reach millions.

Closure will not mean the end of DTT there as the ftv services including E4(according to Newsnight) will still be available.
Cheap stb's are due next month for that purpose.
But I reckon it will be many moons before a commercial venture will attack the DTT market again in the UK.

As regards the Irish system-it has great potential in my view,if it gets over the financial hurdle.I'd imagine that would become more difficult now as convincing financiers that the same thing wouldn't happen here would be difficult.
The proposed Irish service being very high power(50 kw) and available to many with just an indoor aerial.
And a very attractive internet service to boot.

I agree with Damo, regarding their business model and in a perverse way as a business person myself, it's comforting to know that such a huge combination as Granada and Carlton can run a business as badly as this-theres hope for the rest of us!
mm

Mossy Monk

ITV Digital can blame no one else but themselves over this. the money they were looking for to get their sport channel on Sky was crazy.

seeing as the UK's DTT is a shambles how do other DTT systems across Europe compare? are they in difficulty or are they doing well?

byte

I am looking forward to Irish DTT and the internet access it promises. Did It's TV get the money yet?

As for ITV Digital, I don't think the name change from ONdigital helped. It just confused people.

Who is to blame for the low power output of DTT in UK? The Tx owners?

Irishbyte,
As you can imagine, there are so many UHF analogue transmitters in GB,the decision to keep Digital powers so ridiculously low was made in fear of causing interference to them.

Ireland being mostly rural has less uhf analog obviously and therefore more scope for DTT's high power transmissions and more UHF channels available to broadcast on
Thereby avoiding the UK fiasco, a place where in my opinion DTT wasn't suited at all for a private company unless there was going to be immediate total analog shutdown.
mm

byte

Ah, I see what you mean mm.

Just sussed that IT'S part of IT'S TV stands for Irish Terrestrial Services! Didn't know that!:D

CHRISTYG

If ITV Digital closes in "10 days" as it says on another website, quoting "Media Guardian"-well that was 2 days ago- so that would be April 1-so, as the European Cup-I still call it that, none of this Champion's League crap- quarter-finals are April 2/3, where would they go? ITV2, maybe?


PS. I know to people in the Republic, it makes no difference, as they'll be on TV3, but to people like me in the North, it is important!

icdg

The word seems to be that if ITV Sport Channel closes (along with the rest of ITV Digital), the Champions League football will continue on ITV-2.

As for E4, I don't see how it can continue broadcasting without ITV Digital. True it is carried on the D3 & 4 multiplex, but it is part of the ITV Digital package. Something else rares its head. ITV Digital run the entire CAS system for the DTT network. No-one will be able to run a subscription service without them? Software updates might also have to cease as ITV Digital provides these too...

This is without any of the turmoil which the Football League seems to be in for if the venture goes under. And what will be the effect on the Granada and Carlton share prices?

Maybe UTV2 will return though...

DMC

Doomsday scenario begining to catch a hold...

Writs will fly over ITV Digital collapse http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,7493,673677,00.html

The best bits here....

"The collapse of ITV Digital will unleash a torrent of writs, P45s and resignations, and could irrevocably damage consumer confidence in terrestrial digital TV.

If the board of ITV Digital doesn't agree today to reopen negotiations with the Football League, the mechanism for appointing Deloitte & Touche as administrators will be put in place.

The ITV chief executive, Stuart Prebble, wrote to the chairmen of all 72 clubs on Friday warning them the business would go to the wall unless they came back to the negotiating table. He warned that ITV Sport would be off air by next Saturday.

But in a game of intense brinkmanship, the chairman of the Football League, Keith Harris, vowed not to give in. "

Tick, tock, tick tock.... I feel like watching the end of "High Noon" now

Charles Slane

Originally posted by DamoDMC

But in a game of intense brinkmanship, the chairman of the Football League, Keith Harris, vowed not to give in. "

Did they mention what Orville has to say about all this ?????

But seriously, what about the proposed boycott of ITV ?

I don't think I've ever seen big business arguments played out so publicly and so bitterly.

Would you boycott Coronation Street to save ITV Sport (assuming you had it in the first place) ?

Originally posted by icdg:

As for E4, I don't see how it can continue broadcasting without ITV Digital. True it is carried on the D3 & 4 multiplex, but it is part of the ITV Digital package. Something else rares its head. ITV Digital run the entire CAS system for the DTT network. No-one will be able to run a subscription service without them? Software updates might also have to cease as ITV Digital provides these too...

Yeap, thinking about it it would seem silly to have E4 fta on Dtt in the UK alongside Ch4,when it's showing the best bits of the latter earlier-but they said it would be on newsnight so it must be true:D

Whats going to happen regarding software updates and future subscription services must be up in the air.
Given that their Reception problems ultimately have to wait untill analog shutdown or untill technololgy improves,No commercial company in their right mind would probably touch UK Dtt.
I would be surprised if any commercial outfit does.
mm
p.s
My ITV dig box is running well-will let ye know what happens come April.

Charles Slane

The following appears on the Media Guardian

"BBC prepares to fill ITV Digital void

ITV Digital customers are likely to be offered a replacement package of free channels if the service comes off the air in the next 10 days.

The BBC is expected to step in to ensure TV screens do not go blank overnight and to minimise the damage to consumer confidence in digital television.

The corporation is already leading the way in developing a package of free channels as an alternative to BSkyB......

.......Technically, the set-top boxes that allow viewers to access the service are the property of ITV Digital, which subsidised the cost to consumers.

However, no one expects the company to send an army of staff to knock on subscribers' doors and retrieve the boxes......."

The full story is here -
http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,7493,672527,00.html

The whole thing raises a lot of issues, one of which is of interest to anyone with Sky Digital - many channels that are on both ITV Digital and Sky Digital platforms will suffer a huge drop of audience if ITV Digital closes, thus losing a lot of advertising, and possibly making them unable to survive on just Sky Digital.

It's possible that a lot of channels may go to the wall.

Not good news for anyone.

DMC

Originally posted by Charles Slane
Did they mention what Orville has to say about all this ?????

Groan! :rolleyes: I hate that duck!! :rolleyes:

But seriously, what about the proposed boycott of ITV ?

I don't think I've ever seen big business arguments played out so publicly and so bitterly.

Would you boycott Coronation Street to save ITV Sport (assuming you had it in the first place) ?

I already boycott Corrie! Have'nt watched it in years....

But its men who predominately watch football, and women who watch Corrie, it aint gonna hurt that much. Women are normally the masters of the remote in most houses at 7:30pm.....

It's extemely public, which is bad news for Granada and Carlton, as whenn writs were mention, oh their shares dived!

byte

Whilst originally, I couldn't care less whether ITV Digital closed or not, I now think it wouldn't be a good thing for channels as Charles Slane says "It's possible that a lot of channels may go to the wall" which could be a likely scenario.

You have to admit though, ITV paid a heck of amount of money just for Nationwide football, dontcha think?

Charles Slane

It looks like efforts to keep ITV Digital going are not working -

"ITV Digital to close at weekend
Posted on Tuesday, 26th March 2002 at 11:53 GMT by Mark Hughes
Carlon and Granada, owners of ITV Digital, have made what appears to be a final offer to the Football League for the remainder of the Nationwide League football coverage. If the deal is not accepted, the company will be put into the hands of administrators this weekend."

Full story here -

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/displayarticle.php?id=6823

DMC

Dougal: Eh Totus tous minumus canus Costuracurta Baggio Roberto...


ITV firms accepted liability in original tender

http://media.guardian.co.uk/city/story/0,7497,674251,00.html

"The Football League's case for recovering the remaining £178m it is owed by ITV Digital has been strengthened by the revelation that Carlton and Granada accepted full liability for the deal in a tender document submitted in June 2000.

One of the key planks of ITV Digital's case for slashing the amount it pays for the £315m three year deal is its assertion that parent companies Carlton and Granada are not liable to compensate the clubs if it pulls the plug.

Although Carlton and Granada's liability is not mentioned in the actual contract signed by the two parties, the Football League argues that the spirit of the negotiations suggested Carlton and Granada are liable. "

Rebel18

To be honest I couldnt give a monkeys crap about itv and their trobuled digital setup. Im sure many viewers over in england agree with me. Why? Well if you have been a loyal subscriber to sky just to watch premier league + nationwide football you would have been annoyed to subscribe to both. And to get all the soccer you have to get both setups.
Who cares at least tv3 showed the champions league games every tuesday+wednesday comapared to itv. Would you pay more to watch a match on tuesday? NO.

wildcard

I'm in the UK using Telewest Digital (which is fairly meek compared to the stuff Sky offer), and I have to say that IF indeed ITV Digital were to go it would be a huge loss. I'm not sure that handing Sky the UK on a plate would be a good move for long-term freedom of choice.

I've always been confused with the money spent on the football by ITV. Bunch of idiots.

DMC

Bunch of idiots.

ITV cant do football. Like, during the World Cup, if the BBC and ITV show a game at the same time, the BBC will always win by a margin of 3 or 4 to 1

The impact a collapse will have on other platfroms could be damaging for choice of channels recieved.

Remember, like Sky, channels on ITV Digital get a cut of the subscription. Anything between £50m and £100m stg have been quoted. This money is from the subs of ITV Digital, and if that is lost, well, a lot of channels that are on both platforms could go to the wall too.

Rebel18, it matters cos its the business of TV. DTTV is a fledgling operation, and if the country of the best TV in world cant get it right, it will have worldwide repercusions on the future of TV.

Charles Slane

The saga continues ....

http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,7493,674712,00.html

"BSkyB ready to help ITV Digital

John Cassy
Wednesday March 27, 2002
The Guardian

BSkyB is understood to be ready to throw a lifeline to ITV Digital by cutting the rate at which its sells sport and movie channels to the pay-TV platform.......

.....The softening of BSkyB's stance on the wholesale rate at which it sells popular channels comes amid speculation by some in the City that, despite posturing by the League and ITV Digital, an eleventh-hour solution will be reached.

Observers believe that BSkyB's offer reflects the satellite broadcaster's fear that it could face tougher regulation if ITV Digital went under, as well as the loss of £60m in annual programme sales......"

Sky to the rescue ??? Who'd have thought it ???

Charles Slane

News is breaking on Media Guardian that ITV Digital is to be put into administration...

Yes Charles,I just heard on BBC 2's working lunch that It will go into administration this afternoon.
However they added that the football association have just put an 11th hour comprimise to ITV Digital....
So theres still the slimmest possibility that they won't fold.
mm

DMC

BBC are reporting it too....

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/business/newsid_1896000/1896732.stm

"Crisis-hit broadcaster ITV Digital has applied to go into administration, the BBC has learned.
However, frantic attempts are being made to avoid a collapse of the company. The Football League is trying to pull together a last-minute bid for the business. "

Charles Slane

Talk about brinkmanship !!!

PacMan

Its just been on the BBC One' O' Clock News.
Its reported that if ITV Digital goes into administration, that six clubs from the first and second division have plans to go into administration by the end of the week.
Its also reported in todays Media guardian that Sky Digital may help ITV digital, by offering lower prices for its channels.

Charles Slane

Full story in Media Guardian -

"ITV Digital to be wound up

Dan Milmo
Wednesday March 27, 2002


ITV Digital is set to be placed into administration at 3pm after Granada and Carlton Communications decided to pull the plug on the loss-making venture.

Sources close to the companies said a high court application will be made this afternoon to wind up ITV Digital.

Co-owners Granada and Carlton made the decision after the Football League refused to accept a £130m pay cut in their £315m broadcasting deal with the channel"

DMC

5 Live reporting that the Football League said it will accept £90m of the £180m it is owed in August, with the rest open to future negotiation. ITV Digital is still said be insisting it can only pay £50m.

I think that is too late, the decision has been made by the Carlton and Gradada boards, so much harm has happened, they could never recover.

DMC

ATTN: Madman!

Get taping! Tape relevent channels, please!!!

Damien.

Charles Slane

Reports are saying that ITV Sports Channel will close almost immediately.

I wonder how long it will be before all the other (non-FTV) channels start to disappear.

It looks like it's going to be a sad day for ITV Digital subscribers and employees ....

Have 5 live on at the minute,Damo.
No new news so far...
No doubt I will have to go away shortly and like the Kitkat add BSKYB will have announced the take-over:D
mm

PacMan

Sky News are just giving this story a very brief mention.
Not even in the headlines, nor are there any "Breaking news" tickers on screen

DMC

If you have a tape, madman, just to record and hold forever, ITV Digital information channels (the channel 999 equivelent on Sky Digital) or even ITV Sport Channel, if it falls off air shortly after 3pm, as is expected.

dmeehan

From Ireland.com's Breaking News:

Britain's digital terrestrial broadcaster ITV Digital is to be put into administration later today after it made clear it could not meet payments to the English Football League, industry sources said.

Accountancy firm Deloitte & Touche, brought in last month to restructure ITV Digital, is to be appointed administrators, sources said. Deloitte & Touche declined to comment.

ITV Digital, owned by TV groups Granada and Carlton Communications, operates at a loss and had sought to cut the payments it owed to the league for the rights to broadcast its soccer matches.

"We don't hold out much hope for a rescue," a source close to ITV Digital said.

Granada, Carlton and ITV Digital all declined to comment.

Charles Slane

Will they make on-air announcements or will the screen just go blank ?

DMC

Moved to existing open thread.

Attn: Thread merged.

Being discussed for the last hour in the other thread!
mm

The machine is with my brother at the moment, Damo(popular little box:D )
phone call being made!
Will post back later
mm

DMC

Originally posted by Charles Slane
Will they make on-air announcements or will the screen just go blank ?

Well, I'm not expecting "God save the Queen" on a kazoo, while the guy playing it holds his nose and sinks!

I'd say a static on-screen message or continous message being played.

DMC

Originally posted by madman
The machine is with my brother at the moment, Damo(popular little box:D ) phone call being made!
Will post back later
mm

Cheers man, history in the making, lad (or )

CHRISTYG

Even though I

A. Never watched it (EVER!!!)


and B. Constantly made fun of it


I still feel sad, more for the good,honest workers who lose their jobs (CERTAINLY not for the "fat cats" who sunk the ship!!!)


RIP ITV Digital

DMC

2:50pm update.

Wonderful Media Guardian again.....

League refuses to play ball over ITV Digital

"The Football League is refusing to come back to the negotiating table despite ITV's threats to wind up ITV Digital this afternoon.

It has vowed to hold out for the full £183m it is owed under the terms of its contract with ITV Digital and dismissed as untrue reports that it has offered to settle for £90m."

CHRISTYG

Gentlemen, at 3:09 p.m. on Wednesday March 27 2002, I officially announce the death of the company formerly known as ITV Digital. May her soul rest in peace.

cableskeptic

I am sorry to see this. As we discussed a few months back the scenario of Sky being the only digital platform in Ireland and the UK is a distinct possibility

Have ITVdigital ceased transmissions?

DMC

The companies, Granada and Carlton, are saying that they "will keep the service running in the short-term."

But expect the ITV Sport channel to go first.

What we can expect is that the platform continues, as a going concern, until some restructuring takes place.

Its not dead yet, but the priests are waiting outside the door of the ward (not to mention the lawyers and their writs)

More news from Media Guardian here and here

Administration bond has been granted.
2 weeks grace given by the Judge for negotiations with the football league to continue.
Failing agreement , then liquidation.
mm
Hope to get to my ITV box this evening (if my Bro would return!!!)

icdg

Originally posted by DamoDMC
ATTN: Madman!

Get taping! Tape relevent channels, please!!!

Damien.

Eek! Trust me to be stuck away from a TV (and my home PC, so I can't update ICDG for now) when the biggest digital television story in three years breaks.

Hopefully home in time for Newsnight where this will all be covered.

It'll be small change compared to the story if NTL goes under, which is now looking a distinct possiblity...

DMC

No rush now, cheers mm, two weeks to find a buyer....

A nominal €1, anyone??

Greg Dyke now on 5 Live..... and he said nothing important. Except that if there were fewer multiplexes, the signal for the remainder could be stronger.

Originally posted by DamoDMC:

Except that if there were fewer multiplexes, the signal for the remainder could be stronger.

A stronger signal on the presely ch 4 mux to guarantee north Wexford reception on 8 or 9 summer days out of ten as opposed to 6 or seven at present would be nice
finally finished work here so, its down to have a look at ITV digital.
It appears that nothing will have changed,So I've two weeks (or maybe more) to get stocke up on vide tapes,Damo:D
mm

byte

It is a shame that it has come to this for ITV Digital. Maybe if they had been more sensible when splashing out the dosh on Nationwide footie, it could stay afloat.:(

robert muldoon

It will be interesing to see what happens in the 2 weeks whether BSkyB or BBC come to the rescue.Threre certainly seems to be long term implications for digital TV on these Islands and also puts BSkyB into a stronger position, which cant be too bad for this country.