Freeview Sells Half A Million Decoders In Four Months

The new digital terrestrial platform, Freeview, has sold over half a million set top boxes in the four months since its launch, according to the BBC’s director of marketing and communications, Andy Duncan.

Speaking at the FT New Media & Broadcasting conference earlier today, Duncan confirmed that Freeview had overtaken its now defunct predecessor, ITV Digital (see Administrators Confirm ITV Digital Sale), with the number of digital terrestrial homes approaching 1.4 million this month.

It is understood that this is because in addition to the 500,000 boxes sold, there are thought to be at least 800,000 former ITV Digital viewers using their old set top boxes to receive the service.

Duncan went on to describe the launch of Freeview, in conjunction with Sky and Crown Castle, as the most important thing that the BBC did last year and claimed that the new digital terrestrial service was the “missing piece of the jigsaw” in moving to a fully digital Britain.

He said: “There is now a major new way for millions of our licence fee payers to receive all our services, and the Freeview format appeals to the very audiences that had previously been least likely to go digital.”

Duncan justified the legitimate use of “modern marketing” in promoting the platform and confirmed that the BBC will launch a major new ad campaign to promote its digital channels later this month.

Freeview has been well received since its launch in October last year (see BBC Revives Digital Terrestrial TV With Freeview Launch) and a report from influential broker, Morgan Stanley, suggests that the success of the new digital terrestrial platform has hit ITV harder than expected (see Freeview Launch Hits ITV Harder Than Expected).

BBC: 020 8743 8000 www.freeview.co.uk

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