26th May 2005 10:00
ITV PLC26 May 2005 26 May 2004 ITV plc AGM For the second Annual General Meeting of ITV plc today the Chairman, Sir PeterBurt, said: Over 2004 we achieved our twin objectives of improving our current business andlaying the foundations for our future growth. We have completed the merger,delivered ahead of schedule the £120 million per annum of cost savings that weidentified and have achieved strong growth in the business with 2004 operatingEBITA up by 49%. Our new channels ITV2 and ITV3 are performing exceptionallywell and are the leading digital channels in Digital Terrestrial Televisionhomes. During the summer we expect to hear from Ofcom with the results of thereview of the financial terms of our channel 3 broadcasting licences. From this base we can now exploit the opportunities that we have in the digitalworld including our objectives to: • lead and grow the UK commercial TV market; • develop our content production business; and • increase our revenue streams beyond spot advertising. We have already made progress in a number of these areas including: • the creation of a new business division that will focus on developing consumer based revenues for our content; and • the acquisition of SDN, the operator of one of the multiplexes on Digital Terrestrial Television, which gives us the opportunity for future capacity on the digital platform where our highly successful family of channels performs best. Current performance The viewing share for the ITV family of channels(*) has continued to grow on allthe main platforms over the last six months(+). Within Digital TerrestrialTelevision the increase has been greatest with ITV's channels growing by 1.9share points and accounting for 27.8% of all viewing over that period. In all multichannel homes the share of commercial impacts grew over that periodby 1.9 share points to 41.7%. It is estimated that over the six months to June, ITV plc's* advertising revenueoverall will increase by approximately 3% on the same period last year. Thecombined advertising revenue for ITV1, ITV2 and ITV3 over that period isexpected to be broadly in line with last year. Programmes ITV1 is the most popular channel in peak time, broadcasting the top 370commercial programmes in 2005. ITV's soaps continue to dominate the genre withCoronation Street, consistently the most popular programme on UK television,attracting an average audience of 12 million viewers and a 50.9% share andEmmerdale with an audience of 9.5 million viewers, regularly beating Eastenders. ITV1 has broadcast seven of the top 10 dramas this year, including "Ahead of theClass" which attracted 10.1 million viewers and "Diamond Geezer" which attracted9.9 million viewers. In entertainment, Ant and Dec's Saturday Night Takeawayand the Paul O'Grady show top the ratings. In sport, ITV1 broadcast the BoatRace for the first time, attracting 6 million viewers and in boxing, Amir Khan'srematch with Mario Kindelan was watched by 6.2 million viewers. ITV1 alsobroadcast one of the most widely-watched football matches of the year, Liverpoolknocking Chelsea out of the Champions League on May 3, was watched by more than10.2 million viewers at its peak. The new look ITV Day was launched on April 11 and is providing a significantratings boost in daytime for ITV1. Over the four weeks since launch ITV1'sshare of commercial impacts for housewives during ITV Day programming is up by1.3 share points to 46.4% compared to the same period last year. Looking ahead to the autumn, we have a drama line up that will bring ITV1 anupmarket ABC1 audience profile. This will include new titles including"Jericho" with Robert Lindsay, "Vincent" with Ray Winstone, "All about George"with Rik Mayall and "Wallace and Edward" with Joely Richardson; as well as newseries of many returning favourites like "Poirot", "Midsomer Murders", "Foyle'sWar", "Doc Martin" and "Miss Marple". Charles Allen, Chief Executive, said: "Our success in growing our audiences isthe result of planning and scheduling our new channels and leveraging theresources of our unparalleled production business and programme library. Wewill continue this work and will launch another new channel, ITV4, later in theyear aimed at a male demographic." For further enquiries please contact: ITV plc Tel: 020 7620 1620Charles Allen Chief ExecutiveHenry Staunton Finance DirectorJames Tibbitts Company SecretaryBrigitte Trafford Director of Communications Citigate Dewe Rogerson Tel: 020 7638 9571Jonathan ClareSimon RigbyAnthony Kennaway Website www.itvplc.com ------------------------------------------------------------- (*) ITV1, ITV2, ITV3, ITV News and GMTV (+) 1st November 2004 up to 24th April 2005 This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock ExchangeRelated Shares:
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