JUST what is ITC and what does it do? One of the vagaries of ATV House is that there is no ground floor through-way between the eastern and western halves of the building. Maybe this is one of the reasons so many members of ATV themselves have little idea of what is happening in the western sector, occupied by ITC.

The initials stand for Incorporated Television Company.

It is a wholly owned subsidiary of ATV , and it has a dual function.

ITC is responsible for all the film series — such as “William Tell”, “The Invisible Man”, “Danger Man”, “Supercar” and “Sir Francis Drake” — for ATV. It is also responsible for the sales of all ATV-produced programmes throughout the world.

The ATV organisation leads the way in the international sales of television product, through ITC, London and ITC (Independent Television Corporation) New York, the latter with a team of salesmen selling to stations throughout America and covering the Western hemisphere. The company has agents in Germany, Italy, France, Spain, Thailand, Japan, Manilla, Canada and Australia, as well as many others. It is the largest integrated organisation in the world for the distribution of TV programmes.

All over the world people are watching ATV. Overseas sales of the Company’s products, through its subsidiary ITC, now exceed 3,750 different programmes.

We are therefore playing an important part in Britain’s export trade, bringing into the country much needed foreign currency — a fact which is all too frequently forgotten by our critics.

PIONEERING

ATV decided six years ago to make a long-term investment by planning to break into world markets almost before they existed. Even today, the full potential has by no means been reached. Almost every week, new television stations are being opened in various parts of the globe.

It was obvious that television film series could not be made as economic propositions for showing only in our country. To get their money back, they would have to penetrate markets which would come into existence in the years to follow. The production of these series therefore represented a heavy ATV investment in the future.

This pioneering has resulted in an organisation which is now taking ATV programmes to almost every country.

The “Adventures of Robin Hood” series first broke the ice in smashing into the American market. More recently, our “Danger Man” series has won a new regard for British-made product in the United States and elsewhere, and “Sir Francis Drake” has just been bought for peak-hour network showing by N.B.C.

“Supercar” is also enjoying phenomenal and rapidly increasing success in America, with the result that ITC has just embarked on a new puppet series. “Fireball XL-5”, which is being produced by the “Supercar” team.

Mike Nidorf, president of ITC in America, is now visiting London, and is more enthusiastic than ever about the future of our product in the States. “It’s a hard battle”, he points out, “The American attitude is, ‘We’ve got enough of our own mediocre material without having to take any from other countries. But give us something that’s really good, and we’ll be glad to take it’. They are so pleased with ‘Supercar’ and ‘Danger Man’ that we now have greater opportunities than ever. From what I can judge of ‘Man of the World’, ‘The Saint’ and ‘Fireball’, we’ll really be going into orbit this year!”

“Man of the World” is now in production at Shepperton Studios with Craig Stevens starring, and “The Saint”, with Roger Moore in the title role, is being made at the ABPC Studios, Elstree. Both are one-hour shows of twenty-six episodes.

DUBBED

Many of our programmes are “dubbed” into French, Spanish, German, Portuguese and Italian.

Our shows can be seen on TV screens in such areas as Arabia, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bermuda, Canada, Cyprus, Denmark, Egypt, Finland, France, Germany, Gibraltar, Holland, Hong Kong, Iran, Iraq, Italy, Japan, Lebanon, Luxembourg, Malta, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway, Poland, the Philippines, Portugal, Spain, Rhodesia, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, Yugoslavia, Monaco and Czechoslovakia.

The adventures of John Drake in “Danger Man” are being followed just as avidly in such countries as Sweden, Poland, Germany and Portugal as they are in Britain. In Thailand the children are enjoying “Noddy in Toyland”. In Egypt and Japan they thrill to the adventures of William Tell.

DOCUMENTARIES

Sales abroad are not restricted to fictional TV programmes. Several of the documentaries we have made are being shown on overseas screens. Australia, Finland, Germany, Hong-Kong, Hungary, Malta, Norway and Sweden have all bought the brilliant documentary ATV producer James Bredin made in South America earlier this year.

ITC is right on the spot wherever new stations are opened, as with the new one at Lagos, Nigeria; another in Northern Rhodesia; one in Malta, and another in Gibraltar; and the soon-to-be-opened stations in Sierra Leone, Trinidad, and Nairobi. Australia has plans for several new stations as well.

If you’re working on programmes for ATV, don’t imagine that only home audiences are going to see them. You’re making them for viewers right the way round the world!

Our other interests

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THE work of ITC is only one of the ways in which the Company has been able to diversify its interests beyond that of being television contractor for London at the weekends and the Midlands, Monday to Friday.

Other companies in which ATV is concerned include:

ATV (Australia) Pty. Ltd.: This is a wholly owned subsidiary which has been operating for nearly four years in Sydney. It has holdings in seven radio stations and participates in the Australia-wide Macquarie Radio Network. Through a subsidiary called Artransa radio programmes are produced and sold in many countries outside Australia. ATV (Australia) also has interests in eight television stations in places such as Sydney, Adelaide and Brisbane.

Planned Musk Ltd.: All over Britain people in offices, factories, shops and restaurants are listening every day to Muzak — a selected programme of music piped to them direct from several centres which have been set up. This company was started as an ATV subsidiary over three years ago.

Pye Records Ltd.: The Company owns 50 per cent of this, the third largest record company in the country.

British Relay Wireless & Television: ATV has more than two million shares in this company which serves 17 metropolitan boroughs in London with wired TV and radio and has networks covering extensive areas of the West Midlands, Yorkshire and Scotland. Big plans for participation in coin-in-the-slot TV, when permitted by law, have recently been announced by BRW.

Canastel Broadcasting Co. Ltd.: A wholly owned company in Halifax, Nova Scotia which has investments in radio and television stations at Halifax and in a Vancouver TV station, and also the company which supervises the networking of programmes in Canada.

Ambassador Bowling Ltd.: This company has been formed to cater for the ten-pin bowling enthusiasts. A centre has been opened at Ipswich and another will shortly come into operation at Stevenage, Herts. Other centres are also planned.

The post World Sales for our Shows appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

WHAT type of man is the new Chairman of the Company, Sir Robert Renwick, Bart., K.B.E.; stockbroker, company director, pioneer of Independent Television and chairman of the newly formed British Space Development Company?

He has been described in the newspapers as “tough”, “shrewd”, “enthusiastic”, “hard-working” and “a man fanatically interested in what he is going to do next”.

He is 57 — his birthday was the fourth of this month — has five grandchildren, one son and three daughters. He does most of his work from a small office down a lane off Threadneedle Street and spends most of his spare time at his country cottage at Winkfield, Berks.

Most mornings of the week Sir Robert takes a ninepenny ride on the Underground from Marble Arch to the Bank.

BY TUBE

“I go by tube because it is the best means of communication in London at that particular time of the day” he says. On the subject of communication Sir Robert can be considered to have expert knowledge. During the war he was Controller of Communications, Air Ministry and Controller of Communications Equipment, Ministry of Aircraft Production.

He played a big part in setting up the vast radar network which ringed Britain during the vital years of the struggle for supremacy in the air and the radar system later used to such good effect in the offensive by Bomber Command. He was also chairman of the Airborne Forces Committee which directed the fitting out of Britain’s airborne expeditions.

When the war ended Sir Robert returned to the great County of London Electricity Supply Company, founded by his father, Sir Harry Renwick. But these were the days of nationalization and when the Government took over electricity Sir Robert resigned his chairmanship and turned to other interests.

He saw the great potentials of television, both as a form of entertainment and a means of communication. And he resented greatly the monopoly which the Government had vested in the BBC to run the country’s TV service.

Long before ITV was ever talked about in the lobbies at Westminster, long before the term “commercials” ever crept into the vocabulary of the advertising fraternity, Sir Robert and Mr Charles Orr Stanley, who is also an ATV director, campaigned for an independent television service. They received a powerful ally in Mr Norman Collins — now ATV’s Deputy Chairman — who had resigned from the top post in television at the BBC.

FIRST COMPANY

They joined in forming the Associated Broadcasting Development Company in August 1952, the first commercial television company to be created in Britain.

As early as 1947 Sir Robert, as President of the Television Society had urged the Government to give TV more financial support or agree to have commercial programmes on the BBC for a trial period.

When nowadays they casually switch channels for alternative entertainment few viewers remember the tremendous battle the early advocates of ITV had to get them that privilege. Powerful interests were waged against them and at no time could they rally the kind of prestige support which the BBC and anti-ITVers could command.

ACTIVE MEMBER

Sir Robert and his colleagues eventually won the day. ITV came on the air in September 1955 and ATV, the company which had grown out of the original ABDC, helped to provide the first programmes. In the six years of its development Sir Robert has always been an active member. He, Mr Val Parnell, and Mr Lew Grade constitute the executive committee responsible for the day-to-day running of the company.

Now Sir Robert has become the occupant of the chair vacated by Mr Prince Littler, who will continue to serve on the board. He brings to the chairmanship an expert’s knowledge of company affairs. He has twenty other directorships and is chairman of the British Relay Wireless and Television Company Ltd., and the Reliance-Clifton Cables and Industrial Products Co. Ltd.

He is also deputy-chairman of the Institute of Directors, an organization he has helped to build up from a membership of 450 in 1948 to 37,000.

SINCERE BELIEF

He has a sincere belief in the future of television and of ATV in particular. He is a man of vision — a man who has his feet firmly on the ground but has his eyes on the space above us.

“This world of space is to be conquered” he says. “We can only begin to envisage the future that lies ahead in the atmosphere. It is the real Eldorado of the future. The money in space is more than any man ever dreamed of and the future gentlemen of space have a much bigger chance of vast wealth than ever did the adventurers of the Hudson Bay and East India Companies.

“So far as television is concerned we are now only at the bow and arrow stage. Satellites 22,300 miles high will, sooner or later, make world-wide television possible.

“There is no question at all that space communications will come. The language of space communications will be English — and, if we will take the initiative, the centre of communications will continue to be England”.

A BIG POWER

Sir Robert sees this country as a big power in the realms above the clouds providing we grasp our opportunities.

With so much business to attend to, Sir Robert finds little time for relaxation but most nights he drives home to his cottage where he reads the papers, watches television and then goes off for a walk in the fields with his poodle Benjamin.

Sir Robert has decided views about television. He has been very impressed with the work of the company’s engineers and technical staff whose recent exhibition he visited. He thinks technically the industry may have gone ahead of its programmes.

Programmes, he believes, could do with a good deal of improvement. Of personal preferences he says:

“I like Westerns and plays that don’t leave you in mid-air when they end. I believe that most viewers like a good story told in dramatic form without the author trying to be too clever.

ORIGINAL MATERIAL

“Outside Broadcasts, such as our recent visit to the circus, make wonderful television and sport is excellent to watch. I’m not overfond of old films as I think we should produce more original material for television. Series such as “Danger Man” are fine.”

As for the 625-405 line controversy, Sir Robert has had his mind made up longer than most people have had television sets. When TV was restarted after the war he supported Lord Cherwell in the view that it was wrong to go back to 405.

Sir Robert gives the impression of being a man who can completely lake command of any given situation, a man of integrity and purpose who would neither suffer fools gladly nor be impressed by the charlatan. His experience in commerce and industry has convinced him of the great value of concerted effort.

TEAMWORK COUNTS

“It is teamwork that counts — and will count in the future of ATV” he says. “If you are talking to men you know and have faith in, you can get something done in half an hour that would take all day to accomplish with virtual strangers. You must have a good team and inspire them — make them feel that they are doing something worthwhile.”

The post Sir Robert Renwick looks ahead at the Company’s future appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

“Results no less than excellent”

Profits, tax and levy

The Consolidated Profit and Loss Account shows a profit for the Group, before Levy and taxation of £11,059,311 [£171m in today’s money allowing for inflation – Ed]. This represents an increase of £1,699,370 [£26.3m] over the results of the previous year (£9,359,941 [£144.7m]).

Moreover, this year’s trading has had to bear the full brunt of 12 months’ Levy on Television Advertising Revenue. Thus, the sum of £5,432,366 [£84m] had to be set aside for this purpose, as against the sum of £3,837,593 [£59.3m] for the 8 months of the year to the 4th April, 1965 — the year in which the Levy was introduced.

Taxation for the year amounts to £2,780,325 [£43m] as against last year’s figure of £2,752,639 [£42.6m]. In total, therefore. Levy and taxation have consumed no less than £8,212,691 [£127m] (74%) of the Group profit.

It should furthermore be noted that this figure of Levy and taxation payable to the Exchequer is in addition to the sum of £985,253 [£15.2m] payable to the Independent Television Authority for the rental of the London and Midlands Transmitters.

Nevertheless, the Group profit after Levy and taxation amounts to the final figure of £2,846,620 [£44m] as compared with £2,769,709 [£42.8m] for the previous year.

EFFECT OF GOVERNMENT POLICY

In June your Directors announced the intention of recommending a final dividend of 10%, making a total of 26% for the year. The year’s accounts were accordingly drawn up on this basis.

In view, however, of the Government White Paper, “Prices and Incomes Standstill”, I have to tell you that your Directors now feel bound to recommend that the final dividend should be 6½% and not 10%, thus leaving the total dividend at 22½%, as for the previous year.

EXPANSION

The Chairman of a Company which is expanding so rapidly as Associated Television naturally finds himself at a disadvantage in preparing a Report which must suffer some delay before it can reach the hands of the shareholders.

Accordingly, even though these developments have occurred after the end of the financial year under review, I feel that I should report several new acquisitions to your Group’s interests.

First, there is our joint undertaking with Chappell’s in music publishing through our acquisition of a 50% interest in two companies New World Music Limited and Jubilee Music Inc. Secondly, there is the 50% interest in a new publishing company to be formed jointly with the International Publishing Corporation to operate in the general field of educational and industrial training publications and in connection with television programmes.

Thirdly, we have now acquired the remaining 50% of Pye Records making the company a 100% subsidiary of ours.

In addition we have acquired the remaining 49% minority interest in J. Rosenthal (Toys) and are arranging for the acquisition of a 7½ % interest in an insurance company already established by IPC, Reeds Paper Group and Eagle Star.

THEATRES

In my last Report, I referred to your Company’s “largest and most important single investment” in the shape of the acquisition of the whole of the share capital of the Stoll Theatres Corporation and of Moss Empires.

I am now happy to be able to speak of the eminently satisfactory – indeed substantially improved – results of the Theatre Croup, under the Chairmanship of Mr. Prince Littler.

A new record was established for the London Palladium; and, throughout the West End, our theatres played to well-filled houses. Conspicuous among other successes has been Noël Coward’s repertoire of three plays at the Queen’s Theatre which played to capacity business, and “Hello, Dolly!” at Drury Lane.

It is nevertheless sad that the theatre industry, so recently relieved of the burden of Entertainment Tax, should now be saddled with rising costs deriving from the Selective Employment Tax.

ATV NETWORK

In my last year’s Statement I referred to your Company’s policy of “planned expansion”. As this expansion of activities extended into fields other than television, it became increasingly apparent to your Board that a completely new Company framework was required. Accordingly, steps were taken to reconstruct the Group in such a way that the parent Company would become purely the holding Company of its various trading subsidiaries – including a new subsidiary company to be entrusted with the Television Service operated under licence from the Independent Television Authority.

In April, 1966, this major move was completed. A subsidiary company, ATV Network, was created. It was to this new company that, with the agreement of the Independent Television Authority. the Programme Contract with the Authority and the ancillary television activities were transferred.

TV WORLD

The Midlands programme journal for Independent Television is published by Odhams Press Limited on behalf of ATV Network and ABC Television Limited. The success of the magazine has been unprecedented, and sales have risen steadily to well beyond the 700,000 mark.

MERCHANDISING

In none of your Company’s subsidiaries has expansion been more rapid or more satisfactory.

The publishing venture, in association with the News of the World Organisation of the two magazines “TV Century 21” and “Lady Penelope”, has proved eminently successful, and their combined circulation is over the million mark.

The new subsidiary company, J. Rosenthal (Toys), which markets products associated with television programmes is now equipped to become the major distributor in this field, and shows substantial profits.

COLOUR

Colour on the 405-line standard could be made immediately available to the entire British receiving public in the existing VHF services. Those viewers content to watch only black-and-white pictures would remain entirely unaffected. If 405-line Colour Television were authorised in the New Year, ATV Network alone could immediately contribute not less than 20 hours of Colour programmes a week to the Independent Network.

In order that this country should not lag behind in the development of Colour Television, we therefore advocate the earliest possible introduction by the ITA of colour on the 405-line standard in the existing VHF service. By this Autumn, ATV Network’s Studios in London and Elstree will be equipped for Colour operations in the various international line-systems.

EXPORTS

For the first time in television history, British series have been purchased simultaneously by all three American TV Networks. Columbia Broadcasting System purchased 45 episodes of “Secret Agent” (known to British viewers as “Danger Man”), the National Broadcasting Company purchased “The Saint”, and “The London Palladium Show”, and the American Broadcasting Company purchased “The Baron”, “Court Martial” (jointly produced with MCA), and “McGill”, a new series for next season. The triple jackpot of selling to all three networks has at last fallen into British hands.

I am glad, moreover, to be able to say that, for the Eastern Hemisphere, the sales curve of ITC continues to point sharply upwards. Indeed, for the first six months of the current calendar year total sales approximate to the whole of the previous 12 months’ turnover. These sales have been made in more than 50 different countries.

FILM-MAKING

Another intensive programme of film production is currently in hand, including “The Saint” and “McGill” together with a new Patrick McGoohan series “The Prisoner”.

PYE RECORDS

This is the first Annual Report in which I am able to refer to Pye Records as a wholly-owned subsidiary, even though the results contained within the Consolidated Profit and Loss Account reflect only the dividends received under the 50% ownership which then existed.

During the past year, Pye Records has maintained a leading position within the industry. Although in the United States the sudden vogue for British Pop records has somewhat declined, sales have remained good and the overseas sales of Pye Records in other markets have shown a steady improvement.

THE MIDLANDS

At no time in your Company’s history, has the operation of the weekday licence played so conspicuous a part in Midland affairs and the scope of local programming has notably increased.

The first successful five-day-a-week serial, “Crossroads”, originates in Birmingham, and has proved to be nationally popular.

Another Midlands ATV Network programme – this time designed for the young – “Tingha and Tucker” has, as a result of its overwhelming local popularity, now won itself a place in the national Sunday network.

MUZAK

It is all the more agreeable, bearing in mind the originally slow acceptance of this commercial and industrial amenity, to be able at last to refer to its established success. Growth has been rapid, and the daily Muzak audience in the British Isles now numbers some 2,000,000 persons.

BOWLING

In the year under review, the ten bowling centres, comprising 273 bowling lanes, produced satisfactory results showing an improvement over the previous year.

The effects of the Selective Employment Tax cannot do other than affect future profitability.

MANAGEMENT AND STAFF

The debt which your Company owes to the efforts of its Managing Director, Mr. Lew Grade, can in no way be exaggerated. His energy, flair and foresight are apparent in every phase of the Company’s operations and, once again, I most gladly take this opportunity, on your behalf, of thanking him.

I am glad, too, to place on record how fortunate I feel that the Company was to secure the services of Mr. Robin Gill as Deputy Managing Director. The top management team of Mr. Lew Grade and Mr Robin Gill has proved an inestimable asset in the Company’s manifold and expanding affairs.

No less do I and my co-Directors wish to thank all members of Staff throughout the Group. The present healthy and vigorous condition of the Company could never have been achieved without their loyal and devoted work.

The post ATV financial results: 1966 appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

“Trading Profit £5.5 million”

“Another Excellent Year”

In my 1964 Statement I was able to report “an excellent year’s trading”, and I added that I had “every confidence in your Company’s prospects for the ensuing year”.

I am now happy to be able to say that my prediction has proved justified. Associated Television Limited has enjoyed another excellent year — in fact, despite the effects of 8 months’ levy on turnover, the second most profitable in the 10 years’ history of your Company’s activities.

The consolidated Profit and Loss Account shows that the profit of the Group, before taxation, stands at £5,522,348 [£88.9m in today’s money allowing for inflation – Ed] for the 52 weeks to 4th April, 1965.

EXPORTS

This year has been historic as the first in which ATV has broken into the American networks. The series “Danger Man” — re-named “Secret Agent” in the United States — was sold to CBS. Its reception was unprecedented. Following upon three shows which hod failed one after the other it promptly reached first place in the national ratings for programmes in that time period. In consequence, CBS has now placed an order for a further series of “Secret Agent” for next winter. The United States contracts for “Secret Agent” alone ore worth more than $3,000,000 [$30m].

The unique puppet series, “Stingray”, has now earned the highest prices ever paid in syndication — that is to say in sales to individual stations throughout the United States The revenue from this series will, it is estimated, exceed $1,500,000 [$15m] in the United States alone.

During the year 1964/65, overall exports to some 100 Countries throughout the world have resulted in a Sales revenue of nearly £2,000,000 [£32.2m]; and in the current year this figure should be passed by a very substantial margin.

EXCHEQUER LEVY

The levy on turnover, collected by the Independent Television Authority on behalf of the Exchequer, will be in force for the whole 12 months of the ensuing financial year (1965/66). This levy rises at the top end of the scale to no less than 45% of advertising receipts — the highest rate of discriminatory taxation in the history of British industry.

It would be idle to pretend that the effect of the levy on your Company’s profits will not be adverse. It cannot be otherwise. On the other hand, it would be totally misleading to attempt any direct equation between the amount of the levy and the resultant amount of the profits.

In the first place, your Company’s revenue from advertising is substantially higher than it has been at any time in its history: this is due to the exceptional performance of the ATV Sales department. Secondly, internal economies affecting every phase of the ATV operation except programme production have already shown good results. Thirdly, the benefits of diversification are apparent in the form of additional revenue coming from sources which are not subject to the television levy.

EXPANSION

ATV’s policy has been one of planned expansion in those fields in which your Directors and their Management have the widest background of experience and therefore the greatest contribution to make for the future. It was in line with that policy that your Company made its largest and most important single investment by acquiring the whole of the share capital of the Stoll Theatres Corporation Ltd , and of Moss Empires Ltd.

In London, the Stoll Theatres Corporation controls — either freehold or leasehold — the following theatres Coliseum (leased to Cinerama Ltd); Palladium; Victoria Palace; Hippodrome (leased to “Talk of the Town”); Apollo; Her Majesty’s; Globe; Queen’s; Lyric; Phoenix; and Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. And in the provinces: Birmingham Hippodrome; Bristol Hippodrome; Brighton Hippodrome; Liverpool Empire; Manchester Palace; Manchester Hippodrome (site awaiting development); Morecambe Winter Gardens; Nottingham Empire (closed); Nottingham Theatre Royal; and Stoll Picture Theatre, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Considerable as these interests are, they do not in any sense constitute a monopoly of the live theatre, either in London or in the provinces. Nevertheless they do provide a wide and substantial bridge between Television and the Theatre, and I am fully satisfied that this is to the advantage of both.

Still pursuing our line of planned expansion within the entertainment industry, in October of last year your Company purchased a controlling interest in M Berman Ltd., one of Britain’s leading firms of film and theatrical costumiers.

ATV AWARDS

Throughout the country the programmes produced by Independent Television have been preferred to those produced by the BBC in the ratio of 64% to 36%, and the programmes of ATV have greatly contributed to this success. Indeed, never before have so many distinctions for programmes been earned in any one year by the artists, personalities, writers and producers connected with a single Company.

The Guild of Television Producers and Directors made four ATV awards; The Screen Writers Guild made four ATV awards; The Variety Club of Great Britain made three ATV awards; and The Television Society two ATV awards. The awards constitute the acceptance of the outstanding position of Mr. Bernard Braden as the ITV personality of the year, and of “The Plane Makers” as the outstanding dramatic series of the year.

AUDIENCE

The Authority’s transmitter in the London area, where ATV is responsible for the week-end operation, reaches a potential audience of 13.8 million. In the Midlands, where ATV is responsible for the week-day operation, the audience has — as a result of the opening on 30th April, 1965, of the Authority’s Membury relay transmitter — now risen from a potential audience of 8.7 million to one of 9.2 million. This increase in audience potential will in due course be reflected in the revenue-earning potential of the Midand operation.

THE MIDLANDS

During the year we have entirely reshaped the pattern of our regional programmes in the Midlands. At a regular time throughout the week-days, our viewers now see a daily Midlands news and news magazine programme (“ATV Today”). ATV Midlands moreover has established the first successful five-day-a-week serial in British television. This programme, “Crossroads”, originating in the Alpha Studios in Birmingham, has now spread across almost the whole national network, and regularly appears in the regional Top Ten ratings. A national critic recently went so far as to say: “‘Crossroads’ is the biggest television success of 1965”.

COMMONWEALTH

In the past I have indicated that our investment in television companies in Canada has proved disappointing because of the heavy initial losses which these companies incurred. I am now, for the first time, able to report that the companies are soundly profit-making and that the value of ATV’s Canadian holdings has correspondingly increased.

ATV (Distributors) Pty. Ltd., is in the happy position of having been able to arrange sales in Australia of all the major ATV series and programmes which they have been asked to handle.

EDUCATION

ATV has continued to produce three fully networked programmes for schools. These have been well received throughout the entire country In the Midlands, where ATV maintains its own Education Officer, the number of schools in which there are provisions for regular viewing has increased during the year from 1,130 to 1,480.

Outstanding in the field of adult education was the series devised by Mr. Harold Wiltshire, Director of Adult Education at Nottingham, and produced by ATV in co-operation with that University. For the first time in the history of adult education on television in this country, the series (on basic economics) offered viewers the opportunity to enrol for a correspondence course based on the programmes and to have personal contact with tutors. Over 1,600 viewers enrolled, and a further course on a national basis is now being planned.

PYE RECORDS

Pye Records, which is 50% owned by ATV, has enjoyed a year of overall success and of individual successes.

On no fewer than five occasions, records under the Pye label reached the Number One position in the British Top Ten listings. Moreover, during this period British pop discs in general, including those of Pye Records, achieved a new fashionable status in the American market. No one would ever presume to predict how long any trend will continue in the pop record field particularly in the U.S.A. but, as a result of the sudden British boom — described by some critics as a “cult” — the dollar earnings of Pye Records more than doubled. Elsewhere in the world, where the trends are usually steadier, overseas sales of Pye Records have shown on increase of more than 50%.

BOWLING

Ambassador Bowling profitably operated 10 Tenpin Bowling Alleys with a total of 273 bowling lories. Three new Centres were opened during the course of the year — in Hounslow, Wolverhampton, Edgware.

Approximately 250,000 people visit our Centres each week. Tenpin Bowling is a sport which covers all age groups but, it should be noted, by far the greatest numbers fall between the ages of 16 and 26.

“TV WORLD”

The new weekly Midlands programme journal, “TV World,” published by Odhams Press Ltd. and jointly owned by ATV which provides the week-day programmes in the Midlands and by ABC Television Ltd. which provides the Midlands week-end programmes, was launched on 26th September, 1964. Its success was immediate. The circulation has grown consistently and now stands close to the 700,000 mark.

MUZAK

Though in the post the growth of this service of background music for offices, factories and public areas has proved slower than anticipated, the position has appreciably improved during the past year. The total value of contracts secured stands at a figure in excess of £1,000,000 [£16.1m], and is now growing rapidly as the benefits of the service become more widely appreciated.

MANAGEMENT AND STAFF

It would have been impossible for me to write in such confident terms of ATV’s overall buoyancy and prospects for the future if it were not for the vigorous, zealous and able leadership given to the Company by the Managing Director, Mr. Lew Grade. I also send my most sincere thanks and those of my colleagues on the Board to all the Staff throughout the Group for their loyal and hard work.

The post ATV financial results: 1965 appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

POLICY OF “REAL COMPETITION” ADVOCATED THROUGH ADDITIONAL COMMERCIAL T.V. CHANNEL

LOWER PROFIT FROM REDUCED REVENUE, GREATLY INCREASED COSTS AND DEVELOPMENT EXPENDITURE ON NEW SUBSIDIARIES

SIR ROBERT RENWICK CRITICIZES ATTACK ON ADVERTISING

The Seventh Annual General Meeting of Associated Television Limited will be held on September 26 at ATV House, Great Cumberland Place, London, W.

The following is the statement by Sir Robert Renwick, Bt, K.B.E., the chairman, circulated with the report and accounts for the year ended April 30, 1962:—

You will see from the consolidated profit and loss account that the profit of the Group before taxation is £5,038,204 [£89.4m in today’s money allowing for inflation – Ed] as compared with £6,411,899 [£113.8m] for the previous year. This profit is after charging all expenses including depreciation. The provision for depreciation of £439,986 [£7.8m] shows an increase of £157,463 [£2.8m] as compared with the previous year, due to the fact that this is the first year in which is charged a full year’s depreciation on new equipment at our Elstree Studios.

After making allowance for taxation of £2,658,935 [£47.2m] and the interests of outside shareholders, there is left a profit of £2,387,884 [£42.4m] attributable to ATV.

The amount retained in subsidiary companies is £113,708 [£2m] and the balance brought forward from last year is £1,859,608 [£33m], making £4,133,784 [£73.3m] available for appropriation.

An interim dividend of 20 per cent has already been paid and your directors now recommend that a final dividend of 40 per cent be paid again this year. If this recommendation is approved, there will be left a balance of £2,424,909 [£43m] to be carried forward in the accounts of the parent company.

Consolidated Balance-Sheet

Turning to the consolidated balance-sheet it will be noted that under the heading of fixed assets there have been increases both in land and buildings and in plant, equipment and motor vehicles. These are attributable to our new studios at Elstree which are now completed and fully equipped. Whereas the total of trade investments has not altered materially, it will be noted that quoted shares have increased and debentures and loan stock have decreased. This is mainly due to the conversion into shares of the £500,000 [£8.9m] convertible loan stock in British Relay Wireless and Television Limited.

We already have in our balance-sheet an investment reserve of £500,000. Taking our trade investments and investments in subsidiary companies together, your directors are satisfied that the present investment reserve is adequate.

The reduction in Group profit for the year is due to three main causes — greatly increased cost of operations, reduction in advertisement revenue and losses made by subsidiaries in early stages of development

We believe that in time our subsidiaries will make a very useful contribution to the income of your Company. We have never stated, as I have seen reported, that our Company could maintain its present dividend from sources other than the profit which we make as television programme contractors. Our profit at present comes mainly from our operations as contractors for Saturday and Sunday in London and for the five weekdays in Birmingham and the Midlands. These two broken periods are, economically far from ideal.

We advocate a policy of real competition in Commercial television through an additional commercial channel. If we were to have a seven-day operation, not only would there then be real competition, but we would be able to use to the fullest degree, both at home and through our export subsidiaries, the new studios which we have constructed at Elstree, which are the equal of any in the world.

Efforts to Improve Television

Our purpose is to provide good television, and by ploughing back profits into the studios at Elstree we have supplied concrete evidence that we are making in the field of television production the sort of contribution which the Government must have believed in when we were appointed. Nevertheless, it must be appreciated that though we have been able to improve programme standards by bringing into operation the new studios at Elstree with their complex and up-to-date equipment, this has not been achieved without at the same time increasing production costs. Similarly the awards which have been made as a settlement of the Equity strike are also contributing to increased day-to-day costs of putting programmes on the air.

Last year my predecessor in his statement said: “We confirmed to the Pilkington Committee that we accepted the recommendations of the Television Advisory Committee for the adoption of 625 lines as the British standard. In order to give effect to this we offered, on the days we were not broadcasting in London, to put out a new programme on 625 lines in the UHF band which would carry in addition one hour a day of 625 line colour broadcasting — all at our own expense. Surely this would be a great contribution, and something that would give encouragement to the scientists, the technicians, the script writers, the producers and all the many people who will benefit from an expansion of television broadcasting.”

There has been a great deal written about the profits which contractors have made. It is surprising to me that, when a contractor offers to divert a large slice of its profit and to plough it back into advancing the art of television broadcasting, as we proposed, this should not have been mentioned in the Pilkington Report. It seems to me that to use profits to expand the art of broadcasting and to make new programmes available is a better alternative than to force companies, by penal taxation, to pass money to the Exchequer to spend on providing the public, not necessarily with what the public enjoys, but with with what the Pilkington Committee thinks it ought to have.

I am not one to believe that we are called on to make any defence because of the profits we have made in recent years but I think it is a good thing to repeat what the Hankey Committee on television stated in 1945:—

“It is quite clear that, until the television service is well developed, commercial interests would not be willing to incur large expenditure for this purpose, owing, for example, to the limited audience served. In the early stages, therefore, we could not expect sponsored programmes to provide a substantial contribution towards the cost of the television service. In these circumstances and without prejudicing the matter for the future, we feel it would be premature to come to a conclusion on this question.”

I can say that, for several years before and after the war, the people concerned in promoting commercial television lost a considerable amount of money in financing the pioneering work and when eventually the Government agreed to set up a commercial television service it was far from easy to find sufficient sources of capital. This only confirmed the conclusions of the Hankey Committee.

No sooner had the independent television operation started than the rate at which money was being lost became so alarming that it was extremely hard to get any new money. In our own company almost the entire original capital was lost in the first year, so that, far from having “a licence to print money”, we found that we had a licence to lose money in millions. Yet a substantial number of the people who were original shareholders put their hands back into their pockets and produced further capital. Even so, it proved necessary to go outside the group for still further backing. It is easy to be wise after the event, but when one considers the risk involved in putting up money for what, on the best authority, was a very long-odds chance, I cannot agree that the criticisms of large profits are warranted.

It should not be forgotten, that, if risk capital had not been put up six years ago, we would not have had commercial television. We would still have the low standard of television broadcasting which existed at that time. Occasions are bound to arise when it may be necessary to depend on voluntary risk capital if the many projects and services of the future are to be developed. If the Government undermines the confidence of the investor it will make it impossible to get the financial support which will be required if we are to bring many new inventions to the light of day.

The most important objective in the day-to-day existence of your Company is the creation and production of programmes. In London we have Saturday and Sunday. These are the two days when the great mass of our people have time off from work and look forward to relaxation and pleasure. The daily drudgery of any worker can be lightened considerably if great care is given to filling periods of relaxation during the weekend by presenting the right sort of entertainment for ordinary people. We have tried to achieve this by giving pleasure while at the same time maintaining balance in our programmes.

The Pilkington Report

I do not intend in this statement to deal with the Pilkington Report in any detail. I feel that the ordinary people will decide the answer and not the extraordinary people. I would only point out the many references, often of an offensive character, about advertising which have been made in discussions about the report. Advertising is an honourable profession. Its standards in this country are recognized as high throughout the world. The Government is constantly calling for more and more exports. Now there is no weapon in this job of selling so important and vital to its success as advertising. Is it a crime to advertise? — it cannot be right to do it in one place and wrong to do it somewhere else. It is certainly wrong to attack advertising in the way it has been attacked and then to say “but it will be all right as long as the advertising is sold and handled by a state enterprise”.

Many shareholders have written to me about the effect of the Pilkington Report and I can only say to every one of them “You have made an investment in an undertaking which was permitted and promoted by the Government, and you have all the rights and all the freedom to take any legitimate steps you wish to protect your investment”. In the same way, I say to any and all of our viewers — “We are an adult people and each one of us individually has been entrusted with taking political and national decisions of enormous importance, but the Pilkington Committee has made it quite clear that there is one issue we are apparently not mentally capable of deciding, and that is the sort of programmes the majority of people want to see on their television screens”.

Successes Abroad

One of our more important subsidiaries, Incorporated Television Company Limited, continues to be the biggest producer and exporter of British television programmes. Following the network success in the United States and Canada of the “Danger Man” series, a further series “Sir Francis Drake” is being transmitted this summer on the NBC network. During the year, the “Supercar” series, using new techniques with animated puppets, was completed and has been equally successful both here and on the American continent.

Four film series, “Man of the World”, “The Saint”, “Fireball XL5” and “Broadway Goes Latin”, were about to go into production when the strike commenced and as a result of this over six months were lost. However, production is now in progress and we can only hope that there will be no interruption during the coming year; but of course the interruption in our production will affect our sales throughout the world during the present year.

Incorporated Television Company distributes the Group’s products in the eastern hemisphere and supplies these programmes to our American subsidiary, the Independent Television Corporation, for distribution in the western hemisphere. To date over 10,000 hours of programmes have been sold to 32 countries in the eastern hemisphere, covering Australasia. Scandinavia, Western Europe Eastern Europe. Middle East, Far East, India and Africa.

Very few British series have achieved a network showing in the United States of America and our American management have to be congratulated on their achievement.

Australia

Last year we referred to our investment in Australia where we have holdings in seven commercial radio stations including stations in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Canberra, and we are partners in the Australia-wide McQuarrie Radio Network. In commercial television we have interests in eight stations, including Sydney, Adelaide and Brisbane, which are firmly established and are now showing satisfactory returns. Of the remaining five stations, one is in Canberra and four are in important country centres but these stations only commenced transmission in 1962. In addition, we operate a radio programme production company which has a large market for its programmes overseas as well as in Australia.

Last year Australia suffered a severe income recession. I am glad to say we now see definite signs of recovery and look forward to much improved results in the future.

Canada

We continue to sell a substantial amount of material in Canada through the Independent Television Corporation. In addition, we have a capital investment in two Canadian television stations, one in Halifax and one in Vancouver. We were reconciled to the fact that it would take some time before these companies had expanded to the stage of income being able to carry the expenditure. One of the companies has already got into a profit position and the other is now likely to achieve profits ai an earlier date than we originally expected.

Planned Music Limited

Our subsidiary, Planned Music Limited, which promotes the distribution of suitable background music programmes in public buildings, offices, factories, &c., is gradually approaching a period of consolidation. In the last few years the expenses incurred in preparing the groundwork in this particular business were heavier than we had anticipated. During the build-up period the time taken to get G.P.O. lines laid down and contracts completed is a much longer operation than one would expect, and the shortage of certain Post Office lines has, to some degree, continued. A policy of developing in the known profitable areas, with good administration, will, I believe, bring us to a profit-making stage within the next two or three years.

Pye Records Limited, in which we have a substantial interest, progresses according to plan and, although large sums of money are required to establish a records business. We have been making profits for the last three years.

British Relay Wireless and Television Limited

Shareholders will know that for a considerable time we have had a substantial holding in British Relay Wireless & Television Limited. This is one of the leading line networks for bringing programmes into people’s homes and has been in existence for many years. In fact, the original company, Link Sound & Vision Services Ltd., was the first company in this country to operate successfully a system of transmitting television programmes by wire, and consequently doing away with the difficulties of interference and weak signal strength.

Because of the lack of public demand for new television sets, caused by the state of uncertainty while everyone waited for the Pilkington Report, the company has undoubtedly suffered during the last two years. It has nonetheless continued to build and extend its networks, confident that the added complexities of ultra high frequency broadcasting and colour would lead to a greatly increased demand for wire reception. British Relay’s networks are worth many millions of pounds and we know that, if the maximum effect is given to the White Paper recommendations on the number of channels, well over 80 per cent of the company’s existing cables will be able to take all these new programmes, including colour, with practically no capital cost. The future of British Relay is extremely bright and we will do everything possible to help it to become a great success.

In addition, in the field of pay vision, British Relay Wireless & Television Ltd. has a system which in my opinion is technically equal to any other, and certainly from the economic point of view has a great many advantages. 1 believe that pay vision is one of the certainties of things to come and in due course will be available to viewers in this country.

Tribute to Staff

I would like to bring a personal note into my concluding remarks. The strike put a great strain on your company. A large number of our employees had to spend some months in comparative idleness; this not only cost a great deal of money but was a soul-destroying period for everyone concerned. Yet, in spite of the frustration caused by enforced inactivity among staff who love their work, our people supported us wonderfully in that difficult time and were a great encouragement to my fellow directors who are responsible for the day-to-day management of the business.

With the strike at last settled, but almost before we could get back into our production stride, the Pilkington Report was published and more unsettlement was created.

Broadcasting depends on creative people — script writers, producers, directors, actors and technicians — and all of these were thrown into a well of doubt and despondency. It is quite clear to your board that, if we have to go through a long period of uncertainty about the future, this will do irreparable harm to British broadcasting.

We can only say to our staff that we appreciate their great loyalty and we shall do everything in our power to restore a sense of sanity and stability into the commercial side of British broadcasting which is recognized as being unequalled throughout the world.

The post ATV financial results: 1962 appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

MR. PRINCE LITTLER REVIEWS YEAR OF ACHIEVEMENT AND EXPANSION

The Sixth Annual General Meeting of Associated Television Limited will be held on September 28 at ATV House, Great Cumberland Place, London, W.

The following is the statement by Mr. Prince Littler, C.B.E., the chairman, which has been circulated with the report and accounts:—

As shareholders will doubtless have seen, a notice appeared in the national Press on July 21 which read as follows:—

“Associated Television Results

The Directors of Associated Television, for the year ending April 30, 1961, announce a profit of £6,411,899 [£118.4m in today’s money, allowing for inflation – Ed], against a profit for the previous year of £5,388,330 [£99.5m].

The Directors propose recommending the payment of a final dividend of 40 per cent against the payment for the previous year of 30 per cent”

I think that you will agree that this brief but highly satisfactory notice covers the first essential that our shareholders will want to know about their investment in this company, which holds the I.T.A. licence to operate commercial television in London at the weekends and in the Midlands during the weekdays.

There are, however, various sides to the company’s interests and at the end of this address I propose to deal in detail with the more important subsidiary activities of your company.

I think this is a suitable year in which to use our annual report to review what has happened in this company since its foundation, and also to bring our shareholders, as it were, into our board room atmosphere so that they will understand the thinking which has been behind the policies adopted by your directors and appreciate the very able way your executives have put these policies into operation.

In a review of this nature I think there is no better way to start than with an examination of the people who are responsible for running the business.

The Board of Directors supporting me so ably at this moment have all been with the company during its formative years and they are drawn from the learned professions, trade, show business, the Press, state broadcasting, the City, and the great engineering industries. This cross-section of British life at our monthly Board Meetings, on a great number of committees, and at many informal gatherings, literally “lives” television broadcasting and feels the great responsibility we bear in building this organization. In our work we have all been inspired by the adventurous spirit of pioneering in this, the most powerful form of mass communication.

Our Board has become a team where each member, retaining his individuality, has made his own contribution to the eventual unity of both opinion and decision which has marked the history of this company. This team spirit has permeated right down through the organization, and our executives who sit on the Board and those executives who do not, all have a feeling of enormous strength because of the single-minded support and understanding which they get around the board room table.

Many people in many places have argued at great length about who were and who were not responsible for starting commercial television. The point at issue surely is not who started it, but who were the people who have made it the enormous success that it is. I remember many of the arguments which were used on the floor of the House of Commons to show why commercial television would be a bad thing. Above all the arguments one stood out — the oft-quoted Gresham’s law that evil drives out good. A picture was painted showing commercial television as an evil thing likely to force the B.B.C. to lower its standards in order to compete. Looking back now, it is universally acknowledged that, from the moment commercial television started, the B.B.C. programmes became more diversified and the general standard improved, so that not only did the “evil” not drive out the “good”, but the good became better. We in this company recognize that there is a place for both the B.B.C. and companies like our own, and I trust that the feeling of toleration, and often of mutual admiration, will long continue.

When this company started, very few people had any clear idea of how the operation would expand or what the difficulties would be. I have told you at our previous annual meetings that the most prominent feature in those first three years was the rate at which it was possible to lose money. We also learned something else — how difficult it was to get financial support to replace the money we had lost, and therefore, at this stage, it is some gratification to all of us that the shareholders who had the courage to invest in difficult times, and who have gone on investing in this company, sometimes at what might appear to be very high prices, still placed their confidence in our ability to make commercial television broadcasting a success.

Our company has always believed in competition and the decision of the I.T.A. to limit our London broadcasting to weekends is far from our idea of true competition, but, at the time that broadcasting licences were given, we had no alternative but to accept. We believe we should have a competitive seven-day-a-week operation in London where there would be true competition between two commercial stations.

The Pilkington Committee

This brings me to the subject of the Pilkington Committee. This committee was set up by the Government to review the whole broadcasting position and to lay down recommendations for the future.

When the announcement of the formation of the Pilkington Committee was made, we immediately set up a study group to give expression to our own point of view and to give any help we could to the Committee, particularly with regard to the changes which had taken place from the technical and political points of view. Our study group reported that there would not be enough space in the existing television broadcasting bands to enable two competing commercial broadcasting stations to operate in all areas. This fact emerged without any regard to the claims the B.B.C., might make.

We therefore were at a loss to reconcile our belief in the necessity for the competition of a seven-day operation with the incontestable conclusion that there was not sufficient space in Bands I and III.

Your Board, ably supported by our technicians, has always held the point of view that broadcasting companies, commercial or otherwise, must give a lead in all matters of technical television progress. When we first obtained our concession we recognized that it was under technical standards which might have been satisfactory when Britain established the first television service in the world in 1936 but which today had become obsolete, and gradually we, together with others, would have to encourage scientific progress and the adoption of higher broadcasting standards. Our endeavours to deal with the dilemma of creating competition in the London area became the starting point of the proposals which we made to the Pilkington Committee on May 2.

The policy we put forward meant making considerable sacrifices and I am convinced that whether our proposals are actually adopted or not, something on their lines will figure in the recommendations of the Pilkington Committee:—

1. because our proposals are scientifically progressive;
2. our proposals demonstrate a progressive attitude on the part of a commercial television contractor offering to undertake a substantial material, technical and cultural responsibility at his own expense;
3. we offer a method of creating a spirit of competition between contractors;
4. we propose the adoption of new technical standards in line with the development in countries associated with the Eurovision system;
5. we would explore the use of equipment in a new part of the ether in order to make way for colour television and other services.

We confirmed to the Pilkington Committee that we accepted the recommendations of the Television Advisory Committee for the adoption of 625 lines as the British standard. In order to give effect to this we offered, on the days we were not broadcasting in London, to put out a new programme on 625 lines in the UHF band which would carry in addition one hour a day of 625 line colour broadcasting — all at our own expense. Surely this would be a great contribution, and something that would give encouragement to the scientists, the technicians, the script writers, the producers and all the many people who will benefit from an expansion of television broadcasting.

Six Years of Independent Television

When a completely new industry comes into being virtually overnight with the suddenness of commercial television, one of the great problems is that of staff.

Some people came over to us from the B.B.C. — by now some have gone back, this is a healthy interchange — and some, on the technical side, came from the electronics industry. Writers came to us from the newspaper and magazine worlds, and directors and producers joined us from the stage and the films. Thus we gathered together a body of experts in related activities, but, by and large, everybody had to make a fresh start and find the answers to a new set of problems in a new medium.

I remember an executive describing his excitement at joining commercial television and finding a desk with a sheet of blank paper on it — that was all — the rest was up to him.

It should be put on record that the efforts of the staff of our company have made the success of the business possible. Their intelligence, enthusiasm and long hours of gruelling work, often after the ordinary day’s work was done, were factors which not only gave great support to the Board but became the basis of our continuing progress.

I now come to the most important interest both to your Board of Directors and to the company as a whole.

When a television broadcasting station is started, everything centres around your audience. More than ever this was vitally important in the case of the establishment of the British commercial system.

A great battle had raged in the House of Commons about how commercial television would handle a potential audience. Everyone knew that Britain had established one of the finest broadcasting machines in the world — the B.B.C. — with enormous wealth, subsidized by licences, not answerable to the House of Commons, and with all the privileges which accrue to a state service. It was for the audience that had hitherto been served by the B.B.C. that commercial television had to compete, and this was the challenge which we took up. And now after six years of television broadcasting I say with confidence that we have discharged our responsibilities and we have given a service which can stand the most detailed examination.

And what else have we as a broadcasting company done? We have endeavoured, and to a great degree succeeded, in giving our public good entertainment. We all know that there is a small sector of intelligent people who think our programmes are bad because they give the public what they want to see and not what the intelligentsia think they ought to see. Television broadcasting is meant to be entertainment, and while we recognize that the standard of taste ot a great number of the viewers in this country could be higher, we feel it is essential not to get too far ahead of our public, but rather to lift, gradually, the quality of our programmes on a progressive basis.

Television in the Midlands

It is right to refer with emphasis to the importance of that half of our business which stands independently on its own feet as the Midland Television Broadcasting Station for five days a week.

Your Board from the outset has always considered the Midlands a self-contained organization and not an offshoot of a big operation based in London and has therefore appointed a Midlands Controller responsible for its operation.

The Midlands is a country all on its own, and with the new power from the Lichfield transmitter, 2,366,000 homes are covered nightly. Great towns like Leicester, Gloucester, Hereford, Shrewsbury, Stoke, Birmingham, Coventry, Walsall, Wolverhampton, Burton, Nottingham, Northampton, Worcester, West Bromwich, Dudley and many others are spread around in this independent-minded area.

In the South, viewers think of ATV as one of the two London Companies. In the Midlands, they regard ATV as one of the two Midland Companies. ATV is responsible for all the weekday programmes and to 5.4 million viewers in the Midlands, ATV is much more than a symbol on the television screen — it is an important and accepted feature of the Midland scene.

The Midlands programmes include many not seen on the London screen. Lunch Box, Britain’s first regular midday television programme, has now had an unbroken run of well over 1,000 performances. Each weekday in Midlands News (the first regional news programme on British television), the ATV News Unit brings to viewers an up-to-date account of local news and events in the Midlands, while the weekly events are reflected in Midland Montage. The documentary series Look Around features topics of interest ranging from the Severn Story to an investigation of witchcraft in the Cotswolds. The weekly programme Midland Farming not only informs farmers of the newest trends and techniques but instils in the town dweller a new respect for the countryman. New records in late-night viewing have been established by the weekly Midland Profile in which Midlanders tell their life stories. Other regular programmes include the highly popular Hook, Line and Sinker for anglers, features of interest to gardeners and special outside broadcasts of many kinds. A notable series of afternoon programmes has been presented from the famous Cordon Bleu Cookery School.

Last year ATV set up a special department for the development of its television service for Midlands schools, under the guidance of a distinguished education advisory committee. The first two series, French from France and Ici La France were produced by ATV entirely in France. They were first shown in the Midlands from January this year. From September these two series will be seen throughout the country, together with a new ATV series in mathematics. A further ATV schools series on chemistry will also be presented in the Midlands from the same date. These are just a few of the ways in which ATV is serving the Midlands of England.

The profits from this area have been most satisfactory. The standard of programmes has been high. The public has been enthusiastic about the entertainment; and our engineers have seen, by the establishment of a two-way television micro-wave link operating all through the day and night, that we have the closest communication between our two stations.

Profit and Loss Account

Now I will refer back to my opening remarks in this review and tell you about the profits for the year. You will see from the Consolidated Profit and Loss Account that the profit of the Group before taxation is £6,411,899 [£118.4m] as compared with £5,388,330 [£99.5m] for the previous year, an increase in excess of £1m [£18.5m]. This profit is after charging all expenses including depreciation. The provision for depreciation of £282,523 [£5.2m] shows an increase of £27,481 [£507,000] as compared with the previous year. It should be noted that directors’ fees and directors’ other emoluments are lower than in the previous year. Income from Trade Investments which forms part of your company’s profits, is £32,933 [£608,000] higher than last year.

From the profit mentioned above taxation absorbs £3,239,810 [£59.8m] and the profit attributable to outside shareholders in subsidiary companies is £25,037 [£462,000], leaving £3,147,052 [£58m] profit attributable to ATV.

After deducting the amounts retained in subsidiary companies of £84,348 [£1.6m] and adding the previous year’s unappropriated profit of £505,779 [£9.3m] there is £3,568,483 [£65.9m] available for appropriation.

From this figure has to be deducted the interim dividend of 20 per cent paid on January 24, 1961, leaving £2,998,858 [£55.4m] for disposal. In view of the results achieved during this period your directors recommend a final dividend of 40 per cent making 60 per cent for the year as compared with 50 per cent for the previous year. This increased dividend, if approved, will absorb £1,139,250 [£21m], leaving £1,859,608 [£34.3m] to be carried forward in the accounts of the parent company.

Consolidated Balance Sheet

Turning to the Consolidated Balance Sheet it should be noted that the accounts of our American subsidiary, Independent Television Corporation, have been included for the first time. This is reflected in the increase in goodwill, film rights, debtors, creditors and advances from bankers. The considerable increase in fixed assets is mainly due to the building of our new television centre at Elstree.

I feel that the item Trade Investments requires some explanation. Trade Investments have increased on account of additional investments in British Relay Wireless & Television Ltd. (mentioned elsewhere in the report) and in Canadian television and because of a revaluation of certain of our Australian assets. However, these increases have to a certain extent been offset by the removal of the investment in Independent Television Corporation, which has now become a subsidiary company.

The reduction in bank balances, deposits and cash in hand has been caused mainly by the construction of the Elstree Studios and by additional investment.

Bricks and Mortar

“Bricks and mortar” is the descriptive phrase the bankers use when they talk about the buildings on the asset side of a balance sheet. In a broadcasting service bricks and mortar come into your calculations at practically every turn.

In broadcasting you need big buildings and small buildings, buildings in this location and that location, and they are all part and parcel of your work.

If you try to centralize, too much time is wasted by important people travelling. Again, actors may be wanted for rehearsal at a moment’s notice and it is quite impossible to take them far from the location where they are appearing. Therefore, many buildings are necessary in many different places. Some, for instance, are wanted for quick rehearsals, some for storage for special materials, some for administrative offices near the seat of a particular operation. All of these buildings together with our centrepiece for production — Elstree — make up the pattern of our efficient ATV organization.

The Head Office building at ATV House, Great Cumberland Place, of 120,000sq. ft. houses the main administration, our sales organization, and also our subsidiary ITC. In the basement are recording studios for our associated company Pye Records, and a West End TV studio for special presentations and interviews with V.I.P.s.

When Elstree is fully completed the Wood Green Theatre, an ex live-variety theatre of 20,000 sq. ft. will still remain operational. There, shows like Startime and Saturday Spectacular, requiring audience participation are being produced.

Foley Street, in the West End of London of some 11,000 sq. ft. is the home of master control and is the switching centre.

With the growing importance of the Midlands we have outgrown our premises at Herbert House, Birmingham, and have taken a lease of the entire ground floor at Rutland House, a handsome new building in Edmund Street, Birmingham. Also in Birmingham we own and jointly operate with ABC the Aston Studios of some 22,500 sq. ft, where such popular shows as Lunch Box and all other local programmes are produced.

In Manchester we maintain an outpost so that our sales force can keep in contact there with agents and advertisers.

Finally, we have small but most important premises located at Hillcrest, Highgate, overlooking London, and a similar place in Birmingham where the signals are picked up and relayed to our master control centres.

Elstree Studios and our Technical Story

Many of the great television programmes of the future, not only on British screens but on screens all over the world, will show what will become a famous caption, “An Elstree Programme”.

We always planned, from the beginning of our contract with the Independent Television Authority, to have an imaginative yet highly functional group of buildings which would give the greatest possible scope to free enterprise television to create programmes of the highest quality.

Now, here at Elstree, on 31 acres, one can see this conception taking shape and, down to the last detail, the organization has been undertaken by our own executives. A team of experts has worked and striven for the last 18 months to take Elstree through its first stages, and engineers and production people have all contributed to achieve an outstanding result. Only people with great faith in the future of commercial television would have undertaken this vast operation. Now we are ready to give the best programmes to an expanding British television service; to give scope for their abilities to script-writers; to give producers and directors the last word in service, and to actors the best possible facilities.

Some of the techniques already developed by our engineers are being used by broadcasters as the basis for their operations in North America and the Commonwealth as well as in this country, and our new studios incorporate many new and valuable devices. In deciding the types of equipment to be used there were two major considerations — the need to allow for a probable change in line standard and the speed of technical advance. The electronics industry is developing new devices and components at such a rate that considerable imagination is needed to design equipment that will not be out-dated before it is built.

The new A.T.V. studios of 9,500 and 6,000 sq. ft. will accommodate not only the 625-line system but also the 525-line system of the United States and Canada. This is in keeping with our policy of creating a programme production centre, where the aim is to produce complete programmes which go out on wire, microwave links, video-tape or any other recording medium which may become available.

As far as equipment is concerned, ATV, here working closely with the Pye Group, has not only incorporated equipment which is unique and in advance of that used in any other studio but has adopted modular or “building brick” construction so that when improved components become available the “ building bricks ” can be replaced by pulling out a unit and plugging in a new and better one. Great emphasis has been placed on the use of transistors wherever possible and alt synchronizing signal generation, picture selection and switching is done by transistors. Transistors are commonly used in everyday devices such as portable radios, but their application to television transmission equipment and to apparatus that can accommodate 405, 525 and 625-line signals is quite new.

There are many significant new components being developed which permit the improvement and widen the scope of technical equipment. ATV’s development department, which is responsible for the design and construction of a large quantity of the new gear now installed has many developments to be introduced when the studio project has passed phase two at the end of this year. For example, the miniature transistorized microphone, used to very great effect on outside broadcasts such as the perenially popular Sunday Night at the London Palladium, is to be redesigned to give even better performance and a completely transistorized microwave equipment of small size and light weight is well advanced.

Developments are in hand on new methods of filming our programmes. While the bulk of recording being done in this country and in America is on video-tape, ATV engineers believe that the future for the interchange of programmes is in the use of a compatible medium such as 16mm film. The limitations on this system are being probed and new and radical techniques are being sought to improve the technical quality of recording.

The second pair of studios is well ahead and will go into operation this autumn. These two studios were planned to be identical with the first two, but within the the short space of time between the installations it has been possible to introduce even newer devices. These will make the studios even more efficient than the first Vauxhall site the company should have been forced to expand elsewhere.

In early 1962, the central technical area will be complete. It will contain all the switching and distribution equipment necessary to coordinate the activities of the first four studios — telecine, video-tape and film recording—and adequate space is being reserved for new developments.

It should be realized what an enormous apparatus, apart from the equipment and the manpower to operate it, is required to produce regularly the programmes which feed the 17in. and 21 in. TV screens of our viewers. At Elstree alone, some 350,000 sq. ft of built-up area are needed by ATV for this purpose.

In the television industry at least ten times the space is required for auxiliary and ancillary purposes as for the actual studio floor space. In consequence, each studio has technical and general control areas of between 12,000 and 15,000 sq. ft., and a technical facilities building exists of some 20,000 sq. ft. Also, we have a production facilities building of some 76,000 sq. ft. housing the carpenters’ shops which make our scenery, the painters who paint the backcloths and flats, and in the props department enormous quantities of used props that are stored for future use. At this moment a producers’ building is going up covering an area of some 82,000 sq. ft., which will house the producers, directors, production assistants, libraries, and provide 10 rehearsal rooms with a floor space of 17,000 sq. ft. So far we have been using 17 different rehearsal rooms spread all over London with a total floor area of some 20,000 sq. ft.

Wardrobe, make-up and dressing rooms take up another 20,000 sq. ft., and ATV is particularly proud of the dressing rooms provided for artists appearing at Elstree — there is even a separate “dressing room” for the performing animals which are often used.

In the transport building of some 41,000 sq. ft. are garaging facilities for ATV’s fleet of transport and outside broadcast vans, also modern workshops as well, where ATV manufactures a great deal of the equipment used in its studios. Finally, so that nobody has to go hungry, there is a canteen geared to serve food to 700 people at one sitting.

The fulfilment of the Elstree project has relieved one of the most pressing needs which had been facing the company. For its future needs the company had already obtained an option on a site at Vauxhall on the South Bank. Owing, however, to planning delays inherent in so centrally situated a site, the company was compelled to make immediate arrangements for the development of its own Elstree studio site. It is a significant indication of the growth of this industry that, while retaining the Vauxhall site the company should have been forced to expand elsewhere.

An Eye to the Future

Three factors condition our attitude towards trainees in the production and technical fields. The need to keep pace with a medium which is hungry for new blood, new ideas, new techniques. The need to train enough talent to provide a “bank” upon which we can draw for replacement. The need to look to the future and provide for the time when the creation of a new network or networks will inevitably result in a serious drain upon the existing talent and experience.

The pattern of training in both the production and technical fields is the same. Once the trainee has been chosen by the selection board, he is immediately put under the wing of a senior member, or members, of the department concerned. The method and length of his training varies from department to department; but, assuming that the right man is chosen, his initial training is designed to expose him as fully as possible to all facets of the business of mounting a television programme. Because this must be the end product it emphasizes an interesting feature in the selection of trainees. It would be safe to assume that the production department would be most concerned with the creative talent of a trainee, and the technical departments with his technical know-how. This is broadly true, of course, but television has had to breed a new body — the engineer with a creative and artistic flair and the creative artist with technical knowhow, and the ability to be aware of and use the facilities available to maximum effect

All training processes vary with the individual and, inevitably, the selection of trainees is much like taking a chance in a lottery. We cut down the odds as much as possible by ensuring that the selection boards comprise the most experienced men in the company. The training, however, can never be the same for each trainee. Some are slow starters and, in the early stages, do not fulfil the promise shown; some leap ahead and, much like the hare in the fable, outstrip their contemporaries. Some never make it at all. But all need patience, perseverance and understanding and in this business more than most others, temperament must be considered and foresight exercized if the full potential of a trainee is to be realized.

Initiative and ideas are the life-blood of television. To get the best out of those who work for us, a great deal of freedom of expression must be granted. Freedom here does not mean licence. It does mean discipline; a need for the individual to learn the rules, the grammar of his job, and to use all his creative and technical ability to express himself within those rules. Every facility open to his seniors is open to the trainee. The only limit to his acquisition of the necessary knowledge is the limit of his own ability to absorb and learn. We are proud of our trainees, and the system we use to train them. Our percentage of success is high, and there is ample evidence that this company, which started in 1955 with the cream of talent and experience available, is passing that know-how down to those who join us along the way.

Incorporated Television

Your wholly-owned subsidiary, ITC—Incorporated Television Company Ltd., is the biggest exporter of British television programmes. ITC is responsible for the production of films which are distributed in the Eastern Hemisphere, including the Iron Curtain countries, and supplies these films to our American subsidiary in the Western Hemisphere. ITC is already a familiar name on the network screens of the United States and Canada, not least through the conspicuous success of the series Danger Man starring Patrick McGoohan. ITC has produced over 1,600 half-hour programmes which have been sold throughout the world. Notable successes have included Robin Hood, Sir Lancelot, Buccaneers and The Invisible Man. It is not too much to say that ITC has contributed in large part to the country’s export drive and the earning of vital foreign currencies. ITC is currently engaged in the production of the series Sir Francis Drake, already sold to CBC in Canada and to the Australian Broadcasting Commission. This is being produced in association with ABC television. Also ITC is producing in conjunction with the Rank Organisation a new one-hour film series, Ghost Squad, already in release and the series has already been sold in the Canadian and Australian markets.

Australia

Every year we have further confirmation of how right was our judgment when we bought our interest in Australia a few years ago.

We have always realized the potential market of the television industry in Australia, and we had this in mind right from the first. Not only are we identified with one of the great radio networks in the Commonwealth, but we are partners in its expansion and in the extension of its reputation in Eastern and Southern Australia.

In addition to that, in so far as the Australian law permits us, we have entered the commercial television field in a substantial way through our organizations there.

Today, we have an investment in the following television broadcasting stations in Australia: Amalgamated Television, Sydney; Southern Television, Adelaide; Queensland Television, Brisbane; Canberra Television; Wollongong Television; Richmond-Tweed Television; Ballarat Television; and Country Television Services. We have no doubt that during the years to come, the same substantial development which our radio stations have achieved in the last 25 years lies in front of our television broadcasting operation.

In addition to ail this, Australia continues to expand as a market for our programmes from this country, and gradually the care and thought we have taken in sending to Australia the right programmes, is being reflected in the size of business we are doing.

Our North American Venture

One of the first plans our management had when we started to create programmes for our British audiences was to provide entertainment of a standard which would have a ready market overseas and particularly in the North American continent.

Here, we were conscious of the fact that the history of selling British entertainment in America has been fraught with difficulties, and in the case of the film industry – many failures. But we felt that to produce programmes of the quality that would sell to an American audience was a further spur to the competitive spirit which we believe is the basis of good broadcasting. We very quickly learnt that just to send somebody to the United States to sell programmes, without having an efficient and well-directed organization was merely a waste of time. For this reason, therefore, we decided some years ago to buy a half interest in a substantial American corporation — Independent Television Corporation.

In the light of experience we decided that if the operation of the American company was to be truly effective in your company’s interests nothing less than complete control would suffice. For that reason, as we reported last year, we bought the other half of the Independent Television Corporation. Having acquired control, we took steps to strengthen the management and reduce the overheads. We are now able to report that these steps have been successful and the operational period to April 30, 1961, has been a profitable one. We would congratulate our American management on their success.

The success of our American company depends on the quality and the amount of the films which the Incorporated Television company is able to make available. In the past, this vital supply was Insufficient, The measures which are being taken and which I have described to you should assure the supply for the future.

This will include Whiplash, Sir Francis Drake, Ghost Squad and Supercar with three more film series being prepared for production before the end of 1961.

Also on the American continent, we have continued to develop our interests in Canada by investing iq radio and television. Our Canadian subsidiary is Canastel Broadcasting Corporation Ltd. and this company now has interests in CJCH, the Halifax, Nova Scotia, commercial radio and television station, and in Vantel Broadcasting Company Ltd., the Vancouver commercial television station. Your board has other plans for developing the company’s interests both in the networking of programmes and in local stations.

The Link with Moscow

This year your company was responsible for providing “live” programme exchanges with the Soviet Union, and was the first to send back coverage of events in Moscow produced jointly between ATV’s production personnel and Soviet Union crews and technicians. The opening of the British Trade Fair in Moscow, at which Mr. Krushchev and many members of the Soviet Praesidium were present, was transmitted live from Moscow; the video-tape recording of the first programme from the Bolshoi Theatre to be seen outside Russia, and an outside broadcast video-tape recorded documentary on the Moscow scene have already been seen by our viewers.

Talks have taken place in Moscow with the USSR television organization and many more programme exchanges are planned for the future.

Gorki Street, USSR, a series of six programmes showing life in the Soviet Union, a programme series similar to the successful Main Street, USA, is in the planning stage, and in this series we will go to all parts of Russia, into the agricultural lands, into the industrial areas, as well as seeing life in the smaller towns.

An exchange of language programmes is being discussed similar to those already being produced in France for schools, and a joint production with Soviet television on the peaceful use of the atom involving both British and Soviet scientists is also in the early stages of planning.

Future plans covering programme exchanges with the Soviet Union include song and dance festivals and broadcasts from the Bolshoi and other famous Russian theatres.

British Relay Wireless & Television

Three years ago we took up half a million pounds worth of convertible loan stock in this company and, as this stock is on the point of being converted into ordinary shares, it is right that reference should now be made to this investment. Since we took up the loan stock, we have taken advantage of our rights to take up shares as if we had been ordinary shareholders in the company. The situation is that, when our stock is converted, we will hold 2,216,025 ordinary shares in the company.

This investment is very closely allied to our interests as television contractors to the Independent Television Authority. BRW & T is a company which was originally started as a radio relay organization and, some 10 years ago, it was amalgamated with the first television relay company in the country, the Link Sound and Vision company, who had an operation working in Gloucester. Gradually the field of operations of the company has expanded and, today, serves 17 metropolitan boroughs in London, has networks covering extensive areas of the West Midlands and Yorkshire and has recently extended its activities into Scotland.

Among the towns served are Ipswich, Peterborough and Corby; Smethwick and Oldbury and adjacent places; Leeds, Sheffield, Bradford, Halifax, Huddersfield and intervening and neighbouring townships.

In Scotland networks have already been established in the principal border towns and in Dundee, while concessions have recently been secured for the operation of relay services in Ayr, Kilmarnock, Cumnock and Irvine in the west.

We recognize that, in a relay business, a substantial amount of capital has to be spent in putting down miles and miles of cable to cover the areas where valuable concessions have been secured. These cables, the terminal units and the station equipment which are concerned with the installation, have to be depreciated; and it is only when the bulk of the depreciation has been written off that the profitability of the undertaking becomes apparent. We believe this is the case with BRW & T. In addition, we are confident that the system, on which both sound and vision services are provided, is the best system that has yet been put into use.

With the possibility of a Pay-as-You-View television service becoming available in Great Britain, we are convinced that it is networks like BRW & T which stand in a most prominent position to derive the greatest advantage from such a service.

In addition, as we have said earlier in our Report, British television has technically to advance, and the networks controlled by BRW & T, with the minimum amount of alteration, can take the 625-line system which is generally anticipated and provide subscribers with the benefits of colour television as well.

Planned Music Ltd.

It is now over three years since we started this important subsidiary operation with the purpose of exploiting in the British Isles and certain other countries in the world the American form of background music called Muzak.

The essential difference between the use of normally recorded music and Muzak is that music as usually performed relies for part of its effect upon great changes of amplitude, or loudness, but in the case of Muzak, the character of the original work is preserved by suitable transcription in a form which is performed without great changes of amplitude, and this results in the music being conveyed to the listener without him suffering or being inconvenienced by very loud or very soft passages.

At first there was resistance to this new amenity in business and commercial life. With so many opportunities nowadays of demonstrating Muzak in operation this resistance is vanishing. There has remained, however, the difficulty of the shortage of certain Post Office lines. In consequence, rather than stand still, Muzak has gone into some territories before the development of the service has made them, in an economic sense, fully ripe.

In America, the market for background music is enormous. Muzak is a multimillion dollar business, and has more than 60 per cent of the market. Background music has become part of life practically everywhere — in offices, factories, banks, shops, restaurants, airport lounges, trains, hospitals, and many other places. Characteristically, this development has not been so early or so rapid in this country. We now estimate, however, that over one million people are regular listeners to a Muzak service in England which shows a good rate of growth in a steadily expanding market.

The aim of Muzak is to make life more pleasant; the influence of music is subtle, it relaxes tensions, helps people to be cheerful, imparts a rhythm and a swing to a task and an interest to an enforced wait.

Over the years, a library of many thousands of recordings for Muzak has been built up. This is a priceless asset as it enables us to give a very much wider choice and scope for endless variation to users of the service. This library is constantly growing as new music becomes available.

During this year, the extension of the services of the Muzak organization on a regional basis has continued and national coverage has now been attained in England. Regional offices exist in London, Reading, Bristol, Birmingham, Manchester and Newcastle. Local and intensified development of the service continues in the main provincial centres. In addition, Travel Muzak is a new service now being supplied to airline operators and shipping companies.

A new company. Planned Equipment Ltd., has also been set up to handle public address and sound engineering services, including Audiomatic equipment. This is a machine which provides information in a number of different languages for foreign visitors to exhibitions. Our machines were a success at the British Trade Fair in Moscow and shareholders will be able to try one for themselves at this year’s Motor Show, where several wiil be installed.

Golden Guinea — and other Discs

In 1960-61 Pye Records Ltd., of which we own 50 per cent, had a year of continued expansion.

The record industry throughout the world has been passing through a period of change and experimentation. On the technical side we have seen the change from the old 78 r.p.m. shellac record to the modern long-player and more recently the development of the stereophonic record. Exciting as these changes have been, they have led to even more exciting developments in marketing techniques.

It was with the introduction of microgroove records 12 years ago that the “repertoire explosion” began. Suddenly, performances could be recorded and heard as never before. The parallel development of gramophone equipment which could do justice to these new recording techniques helped to accelerate the growth of public interest and new recordings were made and issued in ever increasing numbers. For a time the size of the market increased faster than the rate of increase in available recordings, but over the last few years it has become apparent that the industry is overproducing new products, resulting in a smaller sale of each production and a downwards squeeze on profits.

This has led the major companies, principally in the United States, to seek new and better ways of marketing their labels. We have seen there the development of low-priced mass-market labels as a means of producing business which places little reliance on the star quality of individual artists. We have seen in America, too, the sale of records through drug stores, supermarkets, and other outlets, and the development of record clubs run on similar lines to the book clubs.

This is not to say that our record business discounts in any way the value of and need for the established distribution pattern in this country. This is, after all, the backbone of the business; but if the industry is not to stagnate in the next few years new techniques must come, to be used intelligently and in such a way that all levels, i.e., manufacturer, distributor, and retailer, benefit from the overall increase in activity.

Last year was the first full year of direct to dealer trading, now developed so far that every important record retailer in the country is regularly visited, helped, and advised by our records van-man. The light blue vans with the Golden Guinea lettering are a familiar sight in every city and major town of the country.

Golden Guinea family-priced long playing records too are nationally known as the only range of records that give entertainment to all the family. One outstanding issue during the year on this label was the special presentation set of Handel’s Messiah on three records issued for Christmas.

In pops too our artists topped the popularity polls. Sales of their records continued to climb and this label now boasts one of the strongest line-ups of British recording artists in the country.

In Conclusion

In the foregoing I have sought to set out in more detail than in previous years the manifold nature of your company’s activities. In doing so I have paid tribute to the services rendered by the Directors and by our immensely able and devoted staff. I look forward to another year of progress in programme achievement, technical achievement and export achievement.

The post ATV financial results: 1961 appeared first on THIS IS ATV NETWORK from Transdiffusion.

A Memorable Year Yielding Eminently Satisfactory Financial Results

SUCCESS OF BOARD’S DIVERSIFICATION POLICY

The Industry’s Growth Continues

MR. PRINCE LITTLER’S REVIEW OF ACTIVITIES

The Fifth Annual General Meeting of Associated Television Limited will be held at A.T.V. House, Great Cumberland Place. London, W.1, on 28th September 1960.

The following is the statement by the chairman, Mr. Prince Littler, C.B.E.. which has been circulated with the report and accounts:-

The year under review has proved to be a memorable one and has yielded eminently satisfactory financial results.

The proposed dividend means that the Company will have maintained its dividend at the equivalent of 100%, bearing in mind that the capital of the Company was doubled during the course of the past financial year.

Board’s Policy

The principal business of your Company is that of a Programme Contractor licensed by the Independent Television Authority to trade in London and the Midlands, and it is primarily upon this trading that these excellent results have been achieved. It has, however, from the inception of the Company, been the policy of the Board to make investments in allied fields both at home and abroad and, in consequence of this policy, the resources of your Company are now more strongly diversified than any time since it commenced trading.

Developments overseas have proved particularly gratifying in Australia and in Canada. It should, moreover, be noted that in the USA, your Company has recently acquired full control of the Independent Television Corporation of America.

The diversified interests at home are highly encouraging and include the operation of the Muzak franchise, a 50% interest in Pye Records and a substantial and most profitable investment in British Relay Wireless. All these developments will be reported in detail later in this statement.

Success of Consolidation Policy

Your Company has been actively trading for some years. The period of licence from the Independent Television Authority extends until July 1964 and your Board has, with conspicuous success, sought to consolidate the Company’s position as the only major seven-day-a-week Company operating under licence from the Authority.

At the outset of operations your Managing Director, Mr. Val Parnell, and his Deputy Managing Director, Mr. Lew Grade, resisted the pressures put upon them to equip large studios and to build large offices. The volume of programming both for ATV’s own domestic purposes and for the Independent Network as a whole has, however, necessitated a plan of expansion, carefully phased over the past and current years. Your Company has therefore purchased the important riverside site at Vauxhall. Moreover, the Company has proceeded to enlarge its Elstree Studios in order to meet the steadily increasing commitments of live, tape and film production for home and overseas television as a whole.

New Headquarters

During the past year the headquarters of Associated Television Limited have been moved from Television House, Kingsway, to an island site office block in Great Cumberland Place, W.1. The effect of this move has been beneficial to the Staff, and has resulted in a marked increase in inter-departmental efficiency.

The financial results reflect the confidence expressed by your Board in December 1959 when an interim dividend of 8s. per share, less income tax, was declared on the Ordinary Shares of £1 each, and 2s, per share, less income tax, on the ‘A’ Ordinary Stock Units of 5s. each.

Bonus Issue Approved

At an Extraordinary General Meeting held on the 21st January 1960 the shareholders passed a resolution, submitted by your Directors, for the capitalisation of £2,325,000 [£44.3m in today’s money allowing for inflation – Ed] of reserves by the issue of 9,300,000 ‘A’ Ordinary Shares of 5s, each, credited as fully paid, to the holders of the then existing issued share capital in the proportion of four new shares for each existing Ordinary Share of £1 each and one new share for every existing ‘A’ Ordinary Stock Unit of 5s, each. The new shares, on issue, were converted into ‘A’ Ordinary Stock Units of 5s, each.

Profits & Dividends

The Group profit before taxation for the year ended 30th April 1960 amounted to £5,388,330 [£102.6m] as compared with £5,316,493 [£101.3m] in the previous year. Taxation takes £2,711,820 [£51.65m] as against £2,715,076 [£51.72m]. The Group net profit is £2,676,510 [£51m] of which £1,031 [£19,600] is attributable to outside shareholders of subsidiaries leaving a profit attributable to the Parent Company of £2,675,479 [£50.96m] as against £2,601,048 [£49.54m] last year. The subsidiary companies retain £76,852 [£1.5m] leaving £2,598,627 [£49.5m] to be dealt with in the accounts of the Parent Company. To this amount must be added £1,711,215 [£32.6m], the balance brought forward from the previous year, and £445,000 [£8.5m] transferred from General Reserve – making a total of £4,754,842 [£90.6m] before appropriations. Your Directors propose recommend a final dividend of 6/- per share on the Ordinary Shares of £1 each and 1/6 per share on the ‘A’ Ordinary Stock Units of 5/- each. The interim dividend already paid and the proposed final dividend absorb £1,424,063 [£27m]. After deducting this amount, together with the sum of £2,325,000 [£44.3m] involved in the capitalisation effected in January and a transfer of £500,000 [£9.5m] to Investment Reserve, there is a balance of £505,779 [£9.6m] to be carried forward in the accounts of the Parent Company.

The accounts include provision for the distribution of £264,171 [£5m] for the Staff Profit-Sharing Scheme.

Home Investments

In the field of your Company’s home investments, it should be recorded that during the year British Relay Wireless and Television Limited made a bonus issue of one 5/- Ordinary Share for two 5/- Ordinary Shares. From this issue you Company obtained 134,000 new 5/- Ordinary Shares by way of capitalisation and the Conversion Right attached to your Company’s holding of £500,000 [£9.5m] 7% Convertible Unsecured Loan Stock 1967-1968 was increased from 184 to 201 shares for each £100 of stock. In March 1960 British Relay Wireless and Television Limited made a rights issue of two new 5/- Ordinary Shares for five 5/- Ordinary Shares and your Company subscribed for 562,800 new Ordinary Shares of 5 at 19/- each, which was its entitlement in respect of its shareholding and under the terms of the Loan Stock Trust Deed. The Stock is convertible on the 30th September 1961. The shares to which your Company would become entitled on conversion would, if there is no change in the present market price, have a value of approximately £1,100,000 [£21m]. British Relay Wireless and Television Limited has recently made a major extension in the Glasgow area and your Board remains confident that this investment will continue to grow.

New Franchise Acquisition

The subsidiary company which handles the sale of Muzak is developing most satisfactorily and a wide range of customers, including Banks, Hospitals, Hotels and Factories as well as Supermarkets, Restaurants and Shops, are installing this service. In the course of the current year operations have been extended to Birmingham and will shortly be followed by similar expansion in Manchester. In this connection shareholders will be interested to learn that we have acquired the Muzak franchise for Australia and New Zealand and it is felt that there is great opportunity for development of a background music service in this area.

Pye Records, in which your Company has a 50% interest, has been largely reorganised and the new plan of direct distribution to retailers has proved an outstanding success. This, together with the excellent reception given to the ‘Golden Guinea’ records, has had a marked effect upon the gramophone industry as a whole.

Your Group’s British production subsidiary ITC-Incorporated Television Company Limited continues to make good progress, During the past year the number of commercial television stations throughout the world has more than doubled and we are now actively selling programmes in a continually expanding market. The series ‘Danger Man,’ which is still under production Elstree, has been sold over the full Canadian network at a price higher than that previously paid for any similar series. Further series and pilot films are in the planning stage and will shortly commence production.

Overseas Investments

As regards investments overseas in the USA, Independent Television Corporation Inc., which, as at 30th April 1960, we held a 50% participation, has continued to handle the distribution of your Company’s film productions and has achieved a turnover of close to $10,000,000 [$103m]. During most of the period under review conditions have been particularly difficult, largely because of the increasing tendency by the three major television networks to assume an attitude of inflexibility towards programmes proposed by the independent producing companies. Recently, however, there have been signs of a slight improvement in business generally and your Board remains of the opinion that it is vital for the Group to have a direct outlet to the American market.

Since the end of the financial period under review we have purchased the balance of the share capital of Independent Television Corporation Inc. at a price which your Board regards as satisfactory. Having acquired control of the company we have taken steps to strengthen the management and to reduce the overheads of the operation and are confident that in time, and with adequate product available for distribution, this company should prove profitable to the Group. Nevertheless, in view of present uncertainties, you will see that your Board, as a measure of prudence, has set aside in the accounts before you a sum of £500,000 [£9.5m] to Investment Reserve.

In Canada your Company has purchased 25% (the maximum permitted under Canadian law for non-Canadian investors) of CJCH – the Halifax, Nova Scotia, radio station which has been awarded the licence for independent commercial television in that area.

The diversified interests of your wholly owned Australian subsidiary continue to prosper. Commercial radio in general is maintaining its level of profit and commercial television is expanding rapidly. The Sydney Commercial Television Station showing increasing profits and the Queensland and Adelaide Stations are rapidly advancing to profit-making stage. Altogether the Group’s television investments in Australia, which have a book value of nearly £250,000 [£4.8m], have grown in value to a sum greatly in excess of the amount invested. Since the end of the financial period under review ATV (Australia) Pty. Limited has sold the Artransa studios and the film production side of the business to Station ATN, the Sydney Commercial Television Company, in which we hold 9.7% of the share capital. We have retained the profitable radio transcription side of the business.

Level of Acceptability

All these investments business at home and it should ancillary to the Company’s main be recognised that the success of forward in the accounts of the any independent television company must depend upon the degree of popular acceptance of its those programmes by those members of the British public whom it serves. Here, it is noteworthy to add that during the calendar year January to December 1959 the level of acceptability in London (where the weekday programmes are provided by another company) has been 69% against the BBC’s 31%, whereas in the Midlands (where Associated Television Limited has the five-day operation) during the same period the level of acceptability has been 74%, against the BBC’s 26%.

Documentary and Religious Programmes

Despite the fact that such popular productions as Mr. Val Parnell’s ‘Sunday Night at the London Palladium’ have continued to occupy a high place in the ‘Top Ten,’ your Company has been responsible also for such serious documentary programmes as ‘We Dissent’; ‘The Western’ – an enquiry into the popularity of Western films; a medical programme, ‘Fear Begins at 40’: ‘The Art of Architecture’; the series of five lectures by Sir Kenneth Clark on ‘Revolutionary Painters’; the lectures on British Prime Ministers by Dr. A. J. P. Taylor; and the ‘Right to Reply’ series in which Mr. William Clark interviewed among others, Mr. Selwyn Lloyd. Mr. Hugh Gaitskell, the late Aneurin Bevan, Father Trevor Huddleston, M. Jacques Soustelle, M. Hammarskjöld, the late John Foster Dulles, Mr. Krishna Menon, Mr. Henry Cabot Lodge, Mr. Paul Hoffman, and Mr. Norman Manley, Prime Minister of Jamaica.

It will be remembered that Associated Television Limited was the first company to introduce regular religious programmes in Sunday television and those who took part during the past year included their Graces the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, the Bishops of Kensington, Lincoln, Manchester, Woolwich and Bedford, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Liverpool, Dr. Heenan, Dr. Donald Soper and Lord Woolton.

Notable Achievements

Notable also have been those series which, while serious in content, have nevertheless secured maximum audiences. The series ‘Emergency – Ward 10’ has throughout the greater part of the year played to a weekly audience in excess of 20 million viewers. The new series ‘Probation Officer’ has proved equally successful and has earned wide praise from social workers and the Church alike.

Among British companies, your own Company has maintained its lead in the field of international television film production. In addition to such series as ‘Four Just Men’ and ‘Danger Man,’ produced in this country, the Company is just completing a series, ‘Whiplash,’ in Australia.

Company’s Major Role

Your Company has continued to play a major part in the independent television industry itself. Your Deputy Chairman, Mr. Norman Collins, has for the past year acted as Chairman of the Independent Television Companies Association and is currently also the Chairman of Independent Television News Limited, the company which provides the news bulletins for all stations. Mr. James Drummond, the Financial Director of your Company has for the past year acted Chairman of the General Purposes Committee of the Independent Television Companies Association. Mr. Bill Ward, Productions Controller of your Company, is the current Chairman of the Society of Film and Television Arts and I am pleased to place on record that he is the recipient of the Award of the Guild of Television Producers and Screenwriters for the best Light Entertainment Producer of 1959.

The Industry’s Growth

The television industry as a whole continues to grow and it is pleasing to note that during the year under review the ITA has appointed new companies to serve East Anglia and Northern Ireland and has erected a satellite station to give coverage to the Dover area.

By April 1960, 47,578,000 viewers were within reach of programmes broadcast from the ITA transmitters and the average total peak viewing audience for independent television is now over 13,000,000, compared with the BBC’s 5,500,000, as measured by TAM in homes with a choice of programmes.

Your Company’s operations have from the outset been divided between London and the English Midlands and the proportion of locally produced programmes in the Midlands is higher than that of any other independent company.

Your Company, nevertheless, continues to feel that an uninterrupted seven-day-a-week operation in any one area is calculated to provide the most satisfactory service to viewers, and your Company again places on record the fact that, in the public interest, it would welcome the introduction of new stations providing alternative services, so that genuine competition could be assured.

Relations with the Independent Television Authority, under its Chairman Sir Ivone Kirkpatrick, G.C.B., G.C.M.G., have been most closely maintained and I would like to express the gratitude of your Board and more particularly of the Executive Directors for the unfailing service rendered by the officers of the Authority at all levels

Tribute to Management and Staff

As in other years I would, as Chairman, like to pay tribute to the services rendered by the Management. Your Company’s Managing Director, Mr. Val Parnell, and your Deputy Managing Director, Mr. Lew Grade, have continued not only to shoulder the heavy responsibility of the manifold interests of the Company but have added to their other duties by arduous business missions abroad. In addition, non-Executive Directors have continued to render most valuable services to the Company. They have given generously of their time and I would like to express my thanks to them.

Finally, I am happy to report that the Staff in all departments continue to reveal all those characteristics of enthusiasm which have served to build up the Company and I am sure the shareholders will wish to join me in thanking them for their loyal services rendered during the past year. It is gratifying that the Staff Profit-Sharing Scheme again enables the Company to show its appreciation of their efforts.

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