ITV chief executive Dame Carolyn McCall has said ITV initiated the proposed deal for Sky to buy its media and entertainment division.
Speaking at the Royal Television Society London Convention, Dame Carolyn said: “Can I just be clear? We approached Sky.” She added that ITV considered Sky “the single best partner” and said the company’s executive team supported the approach.
ITV struck the agreement in July. The proposed transaction would include ITV’s terrestrial television channels and its streaming service, ITVX. It would not include ITV Studios, the production arm behind programmes including *I’m A Celebrity* and dramas such as *Mr Bates Vs The Post Office*.
Dame Carolyn stressed that the proposal was not a merger. “This is not a merger, this is Sky buying ITV media and entertainment,” she said.
She said the deal reflected the increasingly intense competition in the media and entertainment sector, including competition based on investment and the ability to create content. “The competition is ferocious,” she said. “It’s not just bigger, it’s the investment. Content is where it’s at, that’s what makes you all your money.”
Dame Carolyn, who has been ITV’s chief executive since 2018, said employees at the company understood the reasons for the proposed transaction. “We love what we do in media and entertainment, it matters in ITV,” she said, adding that people at ITV would say they could see the reason for the deal.
Asked whether her job would be complete if the transaction went through, Dame Carolyn replied: “I don’t know.” She described the deal as having developed from a closer working relationship between ITV and Sky.
She said ITV had a large contract with Sky and that the companies had begun working together to bring their streaming businesses together. However, she said their different ownership structures made that impossible without a change in the businesses.
“Clearly, we had to be on their platform,” she said. “We knew, for both of our business, we had to change.”
According to ITV, ITV Studios would become a “pure-play global content business” with its shares listed on the London Stock Exchange if the sale goes through. The production company would also have a long-term agreement to supply content to the newly combined Sky and ITV.
Dame Carolyn said ITV Studios would stand alone as the listed company if the deal were approved by regulators. “We know it is capable of standing as a standalone business,” she said, describing the company as having “the most incredible talent” and as a “really strong business”.
Cecile Frot-Coutaz, chief executive of Sky Studios, also discussed the proposed transaction at the convention. She said she saw it as the creation of a new streaming platform focused on British viewers.
“Comcast has owned Sky since 2018 now, and if anything, there’s been more investment in British content,” she said. “The vision for this is very much a streaming platform for the British viewer.”
She described the proposal as bringing together two major UK media companies and said that was the strength of the transaction.
The deal remains subject to regulatory approval. If completed, it would separate ITV’s media and entertainment operations from ITV Studios, while combining ITV’s channels and streaming service with Sky’s business in a proposed British-focused platform.
