BBC Worldwide doubles profits in two years

BBC Worldwide's profits have doubled in two years but its magazines
division has suffered a downturn in the period to March this year according to its annual report.

The
corporation's main commercial arm's sales were up by 11 per cent to
£784.4m and its profits up by 62 per cent on last year to £89 million
in the period 2005-2006 across its seven core business divisions of
global channels, global TV Sales, content and production, magazines,
home entertainment, children's and digital media.

But its
magazines division sales were down 3 per cent to £163.7 million while
profit was down 12 per cent to £19.3 million. The publisher said that the
one off £6.5 million sale of Eve
magazine to Haymarket in the previous financial year had boosted its
profits then and that on a normalised profit basis 2005-2006 would show
an increase in profits for the division.

The review does not take into
account the subsequent sale of Origin publishing and the non-BBC titles it
publishes, which BBC Worldwide retains a minority stake in as part of
staged exit. The sale was due to the company's commitment to publish
only titles linked to its TV programmes and the division has since set
up Bristol Magazines to produce titles like MindGames, BBC History and
BBC Wildlife.