The biggest takeover in British media history was sealed on Thursday, and with it a promise: Coronation Street, Emmerdale, I'm a Celebrity and Love Island will remain free to watch until at least 2034. Sky has agreed to pay £1.6bn for ITV's broadcast channels and ITVX streaming service, a deal that the two companies say will create a rival strong enough to take on global streaming giants like Netflix and YouTube.
But the guarantee has a limit. Sky chief executive Dana Strong told the BBC that ITV's programmes will stay free-to-air at least until the broadcaster's public service licence obligations expire in 2034. After that, nothing is certain. "If viewers still love Coronation Street in 10 years' time, and I imagine they will, then we'll be negotiating with ITV Studios to make sure that ITV remains the home of Coronation Street, and we would love for it to remain free to air," Strong said. She added, "It's really hard to predict 10 years away, though."
“Sky buys ITV's broadcast and streaming arm for £1.6bn, promising free shows until 2034.”
In the short term, viewers will see some change: Strong promised that some Sky sports coverage would be made available for free on ITV, a move designed to "build audiences and fandom" for sport. But the deal does not include ITV's studio arm, which actually produces Love Island and I'm a Celebrity, nor does it cover Scottish broadcaster STV, which provides Channel 3 in most of Scotland.
Sky's takeover gives it access to millions more viewers and a free-to-air platform with scale and prominence. The companies said the UK media market is undergoing "a profound and rapid transformation, and as competition for audiences intensifies, scale matters more than ever." ITV's chief executive, Dame Carolyn McCall, echoed that. "I think Sky and ITV need this deal because the entire market has changed and the change has been exponential," she told the BBC. "When you look at viewers, there are now 800,000 streaming hours in this market. Five years ago, that was 240,000 – that doesn't even include YouTube."
On news, Strong said Sky was "happy to support" both ITV News and Sky News but admitted it's "a little hard to predict the future" as to how long that commitment would last. For now, the five-year content deal gives viewers a window of stability, but the bigger question – what happens when the free-to-air obligation ends in 2034 – remains unanswered.