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Downton Abbey: the proposed new subscription service could contain content from ITV as well as the BBC.
Downton Abbey: the proposed new subscription service could contain content from ITV as well as the BBC. Photograph: Nick Briggs/ITV
Downton Abbey: the proposed new subscription service could contain content from ITV as well as the BBC. Photograph: Nick Briggs/ITV

BBC gets green light to launch Netflix rival

This article is more than 7 years old

Corporation in talks with potential partners including ITV and NBC Universal about new subscription service

BBC plans to launch a homegrown rival to Netflix and Amazon Prime are a step closer to reality after the government gave it the green light to launch a new paid-for subscription service.

Corporation chiefs have held talks with potential partners including ITV and NBC Universal, owner of the producer of shows including Downton Abbey, about launching a new subscription streaming service, as revealed by the Guardian in March.

Early indications are that it would charge viewers to watch BBC programmes after the 30-day window in which they are currently available to watch for free on the iPlayer has expired.

It may also include some original content – the BBC already premieres a small selection of comedies, drama and documentaries on the iPlayer – but the bulk of the material would already have been shown on the BBC.

Talks with commercial partners suggest its scope would go beyond BBC programmes, however, creating a UK-based global rival to take on House of Cards broadcaster Netflix and Amazon Prime, which will air The Grand Tour, the new motoring show with former Top Gear presenters Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond, later this year.

Currently, viewers who want to watch a BBC programme beyond the iPlayer window can choose to download it from the recently launched BBC Store.

Older BBC content can be accessed on a variety of other platforms including DVDs and pay-TV service UKTV, as well as Amazon Prime and Netflix, which has the rights to shows such as Top Gear.

Last week’s government white paper on the future of the BBC said it “welcomes the BBC’s commitment to develop and test some form of additional subscription services”.

It said it would be up to the BBC to “set to the scope of these plans” but the government said it was “clear that this would be for additional services only”.

“Licence fee payers will not be asked to pay for ‘top-up’ services for anything they currently get,” it added.

Culture secretary John Whittingdale told the Telegraph: “We’re moving into a different world where more and more content is going to be made available on demand. Collaboration with other broadcasters and other production companies we think is important. If they want to explore that kind of thing, we’d encourage them.

“There may come a moment in the future where all television is delivered online, and if you do that it becomes a more realistic practical possibility if you wanted to move towards an element of voluntary subscription, which is why the BBC, who see the way the world is changing, have said: ‘Yeah we will just see for the online provision, whether or not there might be a case for additional new content being delivered on a subscription service, via the iPlayer.’

“That’s something they’re going to look at. It was their suggestion, and they have said they will draw up the scope of the trial.”

The BBC has traditionally been wary of introducing subscription services in the UK, which many would regard as signalling the death knell of the £145.50 licence fee, and any new service would have to pass a number of regulatory hurdles.

BBC strategy chief James Purnell said two years ago that any move to introduce “subscription payments for its services would lead to ‘first and second class’ licence fee payers and cost £500m to implement”.

The BBC white paper also signalled that the government would act to close the £150m iPlayer “loophole” where people can currently watch BBC content for free on-demand if they do not have a TV.

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