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ITV PLC
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Good morning, and thank you for joining us for ITV's 2021 Full Year Results. In a moment, Chris will take you through our operational and financial performance. I will then share our strategy and ambitions for ITV's Digital Acceleration, Phase Two of our More Than TV strategy, and we will, of course, have plenty of time for questions.
At 10:15, the M&E team will take you through our Media and Entertainment strategy, specifically how we are supercharging streaming, which will be followed by a live Q&A session. So I very much hope you'll be able to join us for that as well.
Before I touch on the highlights of our results, I wanted to share a short tape, which demonstrates the fantastic content we have shown on our screens, on your screens, and also programs we have produced for other broadcasters and platform owners globally. Please play the tape.
[Video Presentation] (00:00:52-00:02:21)
As always, a brilliant reel from ITV.
Our financial performance in 2021 was outstanding. We achieved record revenues and very strong earnings. Total ITV Studios revenue was up 28%, with growth across all divisions. Total advertising revenue was up 24% year-on-year, the highest in ITV's history. We saw strong AVOD performance as revenue up 41% compared to 2020 and up 65% compared to 2019. Adjusted EPS was up 40%.
Reflecting the strong cash flows and confidence in the business, the board has proposed a dividend of £0.033 for the full year as previously guided. This is based on two-thirds of the notional full year dividend of £0.05. Looking ahead, the board is committed to a dividend of at least £0.05 per annum, which we intend to grow over time.
These charts demonstrate the significant recovery in 2021, with many of our revenue lines above or close to 2019 levels. Total external revenues were up 24% in 2021, driven by record-breaking advertising revenues and strong growth in Studios and up 4% compared to 2019. ITV Studios revenues were down only about 2% compared to 2019 on a constant currency basis.
Profits have also seen a significant recovery since 2019, driven by revenue performance and tight cost control. Year-on-year adjusted EBITA was up 42% compared to 2020 and up 12% compared to 2019. Cash generation remains strong in 2021, driven by record advertising revenues and a focus on working capital management.
In the summer of 2018, we set out our More Than TV strategy, as many of you will remember. Our ambition for ITV was to be the pre-eminent integrated producer broadcaster in the UK, a world-class creative force in global content production, and to build a leading direct-to-consumer business in the UK. We set out to position our brands in a way that was more modern and digital, alongside creating a sustainable cash-generative and growing business.
Now, I'm really pleased to say that we have delivered on each of those ambitions. It was also essential, of course, that we build capabilities in data analytics and technology to deliver that ambition. We have made good progress on this and in a short space of time, and we continue to build our capabilities in these areas.
So, we have successfully executed Phase One of the strategy in spite of the disruption caused by the pandemic over the last two years, partly by continuing to invest in the strategic priorities that we know would allow us to deliver on our ambition.
Now let me take you through that progress in a little more detail because it has laid the foundations for our confidence in the timing for digital acceleration. ITV is now the largest ad-funded premium streaming service in Europe, having driven strong growth in digital viewing and digital advertising since 2018. We also now have an established and growing SVOD business in the UK and internationally, with more than 3.6 million subscribers globally. We have 1.2 million subscribers in the UK through BritBox UK and Hub+, and BritBox International continues to grow strongly as we roll it out to more countries.
In advertising today, we offer the best of both worlds, with our leading market position in mass simultaneous reach which is so valued by advertisers, and the development of addressable advertising through Planet V, each in a brand-safe and measurable environment. Planet V is now the second largest programmatic video advertising platform in the UK after Google, with over 1,000 users and growing.
Moving on to data and analytics, this is an area where we had little or no capability in 2018, and today we have a Chief Data and AI Officer who is making good progress in building a team of about 115 data analysts and scientists by the end of this year, with capability embedded in each area of the business so that we can extract the right value, whether that's advertising revenue or efficiency gains. It has already become a center of excellence within the company. Our data strategy is clear and understood by all elements of the business.
On technology, we have increased our in-house capability by doubling head count to 300 over the past year to enable the rapid delivery of our digital outputs. In ITV Studios, we've set out to further scale and diversify our world-class Studios business. We are now a key scaled player in the global content market. We are diversified by geography, by genre and by customer base, and we are in a position of strength to take advantage of the growing demand for quality content.
Over the last three years, it's been absolutely key to tightly manage our cash and our costs, and we remain on track to deliver £100 million of cost savings by the end of 2022, which has funded our investments to-date to support our strategic priorities.
So from this track record of delivery and the success of Hub, Hub+, BritBox and Planet V, we see a clear opportunity to supercharge streaming. And by doing that, we will more than double digital revenues by 2026 to at least £750 million. We have the experience and capability needed, and we are confident that we are well placed to achieve it and that now is the right time.
At the heart of this will be ITVX, the first integrated AVOD/SVOD streaming platform in the UK with a digital-first content strategy. This will enable ITV to double digital viewing, double monthly active users and double subscribers.
We've seen a growing demand from viewers to streaming content and from advertisers wanting premium addressable inventory. ITVX will deliver both of these things at scale. This will require significant content investments in our digital-first strategy of £20 million in 2022 and £160 million in 2023, funded by our strong balance sheet and cash flows. We are confident that by 2026, the incremental annual revenue of ITVX will cover the annual incremental investment cost.
Today, we're also announcing a further £50 million of permanent cost savings in 2026 and beyond, which will start to be delivered in 2023.
Now, of course, you're going to hear much more about ITVX from me and the Media and Entertainment team later, but I will now hand over to Chris to go through our operational and financial performance in more detail.
Thanks, Carolyn, and good morning, everyone. And we'll start with the performance of Studios. ITV Studios maintained its good momentum into the second half of the year, with a strong slate of deliveries as we continued to focus on growing and further diversifying by genre, by geography, and by customer.
Despite COVID-19 challenges, the majority of productions continued throughout 2021, with demand for both quality original commissions and library content remaining strong. There's a lot of information on this slide, so I'll highlight just a few points.
Total revenues were up 28%, with good growth across all businesses, but particularly from the UK and the US. Both businesses benefited from a number of significant deliveries in the second half, including I'm a Celebrity and The Outlaws in the UK, and Snowpiercer and Rat in the Kitchen in the US.
Global Formats and Distribution also had a good year with strong demand for our content library of over 90,000 hours and our catalog of almost 300 formats. Adjusted EBITA was up 41% to £215 million, with an adjusted EBITA margin of 12%, impacted by ongoing COVID protocols.
Turning to the KPIs, we remain on track to exceed 2019 revenues in 2022 and to grow total Studios revenue by at least 5% per annum on average to 2026. We also remain committed to return to margins in the range of 13% to 15% by 2023.
High-end scripted hours were up 56%, driven by new dramas such as Vigil in the UK and another season of Snowpiercer in the US. The number of formats sold in three or more countries increased to 15, including Let Love Rule, The Voice Generations, and Beat the Chasers. And the percentage of total revenues from streaming platforms increased by 3 percentage points to 13%, with deliveries such as Physical for Apple+, Season 2 of Summertime for Netflix, and Ten Year Old Tom for HBO Max.
And now on to Media and Entertainment. You'll see a new P&L format for Media and Entertainment. We now disclose total advertising revenue, total UK subscription revenues, SDN, and partnership and other revenue. This last category includes revenue from platforms such as Sky and Virgin Media, competitions revenue, third-party commission, and commercial revenue from our creative partnerships.
In addition, BritBox content spend, which was previously included within variable costs, is now combined with our network schedule costs to give a single content budget across our platforms. A full reconciliation of the old and new format can be found in the appendices.
We've also introduced a new KPI, digital revenue, which will measure the success of our digital-first strategy. Digital revenue is the sum of VOD-related advertising partnership and sponsorship, digital innovation and subscriptions. In 2021, it was £347 million.
As Carolyn said, we saw a strong recovery in the ad market, with total ad revenue up 24%, reaching the highest in ITV's history. Within this, VOD advertising revenue has been strong, up 41%. And this exceptional performance was partly driven by the rebound in the economy, but also the quality of our schedule, continued demand for TV advertising, the unrivaled audiences that we deliver for advertisers, and the relative weakness of cinema, outdoor and print media.
Subscription revenue is up over 50%, driven by the growth in both BritBox UK and Hub+. As expected, SDN's revenue was under pressure this year, down 4%, as older contracts were renewed at the new lower market price for DTT capacity. We expect this pressure to increase over the next few years as further contracts are renewed.
Partnership and other revenue increased by 2%. Within this, third-party NAR commission increased, partly offset by the decrease in competitions revenue, which had been exceptionally strong in 2020 due to the lockdown. Content costs were up 18%, in line with guidance, with a return to a more normal schedule and the Euros. Variable costs were up 10%, largely driven by increased marketing, which was abnormally low in 2020.
And infrastructure and overhead costs increased by 9% due to planned investments of £11 million in ITV Hub, Hub+, data and technology, along with the accrual of staff bonuses, which were cancelled in 2020. We continue with our strong cost-saving program, delivering £30 million of savings in the year, £27 million of which are permanent.
Net investment in BritBox was £48 million, with venture losses of £61 million, in line with expectations. In future, BritBox will be integrated into ITVX. And adjusted EBITA, including BritBox UK, was up 42% to £598 million, with a 26% margin.
Turning to 2022, the advertising momentum has continued into this year, with total advertising revenue in Q1 expected to be up around 16%. It's early days for April, but we expect it to be up around 10% against tougher comparators. And therefore, the four months to April to be up around 14%.
Now, looking at 2021 TAR in a little more detail. Retail and Entertainment & Leisure categories have been particularly strong due to both the return of advertisers, who virtually stopped advertising last year, and others attracted by the significant audiences around the Euros. Whilst up 43% year-on-year, Airlines and Travel spend did not return to 2019 levels due to ongoing travel restrictions and uncertainty. Government, Charities and Other is the only category where spend declined in the year, largely due to the high level of spend in 2020.
E-commerce companies, excluding gambling, continued to increase their spend, with TAR up 28% across the full year, continuing a multi-year double-digit growth trend.
Turning to viewing, we had a strong schedule of drama, entertainment and sport in 2021. ITV had three of the top five biggest new dramas on TV. Series 2 of The Masked Singer was ITV's biggest entertainment series, averaging a 34% share and the Euro semi-final match between England and Denmark achieved the biggest ever peak for a football match on a single channel, with 27.6 million viewers.
Our share of viewing for the ITV Family remained broadly flat in the year, within which ITV main channel achieved its third biggest share of viewing in a decade.
Total ITV viewing was down 9% compared to 2020, a year in which viewing rose sharply due to the pandemic. And this is slightly better than the market, where total TV viewing declined 10%. Total registered users grew 6% to 34.7 million.
As we enter Phase Two of our strategy, we will focus on the KPIs that measure how we are both maximizing our viewing across AVOD and SVOD, and optimizing our Broadcast business.
Starting with AVOD and SVOD KPIs, due to the strong slate of new dramas, the return of key entertainment shows and live sport, total streaming hours were up 22% and monthly active users were up 19% to 9.6 million. Total subscribers were up 33%, with growth across both BritBox UK and ITV Hub+.
Turning to Broadcast, our focus will remain on driving the large audiences, which is so valuable to advertisers, and maintaining our share of broadcast viewing. In 2021, we delivered 93% of the top 1,000 commercial programs and maintained our share of commercial viewing at 33%.
BritBox UK and BritBox International remain a key part of our strategy. We now have 3.1 million BritBox subscribers globally. BritBox UK, which will become an integral part of ITVX, ended the year with over 730,000 subscribers ahead of plan and churn has halved since launch. Subscribers enjoyed five new and exclusive originals in 2021, including Secrets of the Krays and Crime, and we will be launching eight new originals in first half of 2022, including Secrets of the Spies and Why Didn't They Ask Evans?
We continue to roll out BritBox International, which is seeing strong growth in its subscriber base, currently at more than 2.4 million. It's now available in four countries, most recently launching in South Africa, and we will launch in the Nordics in the first half of 2022. As the global pool of streaming subscribers grows, so does the opportunity for BritBox. By 2030, we expect to have attracted 10 million to 12 million subscribers for BritBox internationally outside of the UK.
On to adjusted and statutory results. Adjusted EBITA increased by 42% to £813 million, and adjusted EPS increased by 40% to £0.153. This compares to £0.139 in 2019. Adjusted finances (sic) [financing] costs were down £5 million year-on-year, reflecting the lower levels of net debt in the year and are expected to be around the same level in 2022.
Our adjusted tax rate was 20%. In 2022, we expect the tax rate to remain around the same level. In the medium term, our adjusted tax rate will move to around 25%, in line with the increases in UK corporation tax. Statutory EPS rose from £0.071 to £0.094.
Exceptional items totaled £206 million in 2021, which includes the final payment in respect to Talpa. Restructuring and property costs of £16 million relate to significant business transformation projects and the London offices moving to a single site in White City in 2022.
Pension costs are an estimate of the settlement of Box Clever case. We had a £16 million onerous contract provision as a result of clearing a second satellite transponder and a £22 million provision for employment taxes.
We expect exceptional costs to come down significantly in 2022 to around £60 million, which will largely relate to digital transformation costs and our move to White City, both of which will drive a permanent ongoing reduction in our cost base.
Looking at the balance sheet, our cash conversion was stronger than we expected at 80%, driven by the record advertising revenues and tight working capital management. This was partly offset by the unwinding of the studios' working capital benefits in 2020 and the deferral of 2020 VAT payments to the first half of 2021. We expect to maintain profits to cash conversion at around 80%. Our net debt at the end of the period with £414 million, net debt to adjusted EBITDA is 0.5 times, our covenant leverage is 0.3 times, and we have total liquidity of £1.5 billion.
The accounting deficit of our pension scheme is £8 million. We continue to reduce the volatility of the pension obligations through a combination of inflation and longevity hedging and the cash matching of investments and future liabilities. We expect to agree the triennial actuarial valuation as at the 1st of January 2020 shortly. And we'll agree a new funding contribution plan based on that. We do not expect the funding profile to materially change. We're also looking to replace the existing SDN asset-backed scheme with a similar arrangement.
And finally, 2022 planning assumptions, which are based on our current best view. I've talked through most of the P&L assumptions, and we come on later to give more detail about the specific investments relating to ITVX. The investments of £10 million in our digital innovations is focused on attracting talent and creating content and advertising opportunities targeting 16- to 34-year olds, as well as revenue generation through initiatives such as Planet V, addressable advertising and our Studio 55 incubator. These investments will break even in 2023.
In terms of cash for 2022, CapEx for the full year will be around £70 million. The cash cost of exceptionals is expected to be around £50 million relating to digital transformation costs, accrued earn-out, and our property strategy. And finally, the board is committed to a dividend of at least £0.05 in 2022, which we expect to grow over time.
I'll now hand you back to Carolyn.
Thanks, Chris. I talked earlier about our focus on digital acceleration, and we're clear that our vision is to be a leader in UK streaming and an expanding global force in content. We've refined our three key strategic pillars to reflect this: expanding studios globally and growing revenues faster than the market; supercharging streaming, fundamentally shifting the focus of the business to think digital first; and optimizing broadcast by continuing to attract unrivaled mass simultaneous audiences.
Being an integrated producer broadcaster, as you know, gives us clear strategic competitive advantage. It provides ITV Studios with a base of core commissions and a significant promotional engine for its content. It enables cross-promotion and 360-degree monetization of this across all our business models. It secures access to great content for ITV's channels, AVOD and SVOD businesses. And very importantly, it helps us attract and retain talent, which is, of course, absolutely critical in a creative business.
Now, I'm going to just take each pillar in turn. Let me just start with supercharging streaming. We all know viewers behaviors are changing just as our own behaviors are changing with what we watch, and we have to ensure we have a flexible business model to take advantage of this and which can evolve as viewer and advertiser habits change. We will have a single-scale destination for watching content whenever and however our audiences choose, free and pay, which will create the inventory our advertisers want.
We have undertaken extensive research with viewers and subscribers, and this is what they're telling us. Viewers do want flexibility to watch whenever it suits them free and/or pay in a seamless, consolidated experience. And while they're looking for choice, viewers also like the lean-back experience of always on, FAST channels, which are growing rapidly in the US. And they really, really value watching sports, entertainment, and news live, as the nation's conversation revolves around what we show on screen.
Our in-depth segmental research shows that there is a sizable addressable market for this consumer proposition, 23 million viewers approximately. And we already have a relationship with these viewers, but we aim to increase their frequency of visits and time spent on our streaming service and really deepen that relationship. We will use all the data sets to engage and attract what we are calling mainstreamers to ITVX. And, of course, Rufus is going to talk to you about this in much more detail later on in the M&E seminar.
Alongside changes in viewer habits, we're also seeing evolving needs from our advertisers, as you'd expect. Our strength in live TV as the UK's largest commercial broadcaster with the ability to reach millions of households at the same time remains a unique selling point for advertisers. Advertisers also increasingly want highly valuable addressability and data insights. With ITVX, we will continue to be the client's first choice, bringing them the most value and allowing them to create and measure the most effective ad campaigns across all platforms. ITVX will launch in Q4 of this year. It consolidates our digital offering, as I said, into one integrated AVOD/SVOD platform, the first of its kind in the UK. It will be Britain's freshest new streaming service. We will have a digital first content strategy and we'll be making significant additional content investments, as I said, driving exciting new leading edge content.
ITVX as a brand represents the familiarity, trust, and quality of one of the best loved brands in the UK, but also has many things you would not expect from ITV, and that's where the X comes in. Our brand research indicates that the X intrigues consumers, giving them a sense of excitement and freshness.
ITVX will be AVOD-led, with a compelling SVOD proposition. This is fantastic for viewers, it will provide a simplified and seamless consumer experience, with thousands of hours of free content made up of both library and original exclusive content. ITVX will offer something for everyone. It will always be changing, with more new free content dropping weekly than any other British streamer.
The SVOD tier is targeted at viewers who want a premium offering and includes all of the free content ad free, as well as original content from BritBox UK and our future SVOD content partners. It is also fantastic for advertisers. ITV will fulfill advertisers' appetite for data-driven targeted advertising and mass simultaneous reach. We will have one content budget, as Chris said, across broadcast and streaming, which gives us flexibility in our windowing strategy and enables us to extend the lifecycle of our content to maximize its value, and our revenues across linear, AVOD and SVOD.
Data will, of course, be key to optimizing our windowing strategy and our marketing spend. It will enable us to upsell SVOD to the right viewers as well at the right time. Our data-led viewer model, data analytics capabilities, and the use of higher-value, data-driven pricing models will drive long-term value for ITV.
So, given the significant content investment in streaming, what is changing? I'm going to give you a very brief overview now because
[ph]
Roe (00:28:18) our content director, our director of all content, will give you much more color on the fantastic new content we will deliver to viewers at the investor seminar.
Our digital-first strategy represents a significant change in our content offering. By the time ITVX launches, we will have more than 15,000 hours of streaming content available free and pay. Today, Hub has 4,000 hours. We will offer weekly VOD-exclusive premieres, delivering on our aim of being Britain's freshest new streaming service.
Brand new exclusive series will drop every week, content, which has not been seen anywhere else in the UK, and content which can only be seen on ITVX. There will be 20 new free ad-supported streaming TV channels, always-on FAST channels that are built dynamically around different content themes, harnessing the power of data and analytics to help viewers find their favorite shows.
In addition, all the drama and comedy that we run on our linear channels will be made available to viewers all in one go on ITVX as soon as the first episode has aired. This sits at the very heart of our digital-first approach. In addition to all of that, our AVOD offering would also include hundreds of hours of bingeable acquired box sets and feature films from major studio partners and iconic ITV box sets from the UK.
ITVX's premium tier will include BritBox's 6,000 hours of British content. And in addition to this tier, we'll also include ITVX originals, future streaming partners, and all of ITVX's content ad free. That means that current BritBox subscribers will have access to all of those 15,000 hours, a great benefit for BritBox subscribers because they'll get that all ad free. And ITVX clearly provides a significant opportunity for us to upsell seamlessly from free to pay in a single customer experience.
To enable BritBox's integration into ITVX, to give ITV greater control over BritBox UK, the BBC has ceased to be a shareholder in BritBox UK. The BBC continues as a strong partner for BritBox UK and BritBox International, and we have agreed a new long-term content supply deal with them to the end of their charter. All PSB partners are committed to BritBox UK, which offers consumers a large library of the majority of PSB British content in one place from the past and from the recent past.
ITVX will deliver addressable advertising and harder to reach demographics at a scale not available before, as I said, in a brand safe environment. Campaigns will be tracked, measured and optimized. Furthermore, ITV Adlabs, the new home for all our digital innovation, will drive further value for advertisers, which Kelly will tell you more about later.
We are confident that this is the right strategy and that this is the right time for us to accelerate digitally. And the reason for this is we now have a strong track record of delivery, and we have a depth of understanding of VOD viewers. We have a highly recognized brand and cross professional reach. We have established data capabilities to drive viewing and revenues. We have existing deep advertiser relationships. And Planet V puts us in a really strong position to capitalize on data-driven advertising growth. And finally, as an IPB, an integrated producer broadcaster, with a successful studios business, we have a strategic advantage as I said. ITV Studios will be pivotal in delivering new streaming content to ITVX.
Now, turning to our broadcast division. Despite the ongoing narrative around evolving viewing trends and a shift to digital viewing, our broadcast business continues to consistently deliver unrivalled commercial audiences. In 2021, 93% of the top 1,000 commercial broadcast TV programs were on ITV, whilst ITV main channel share of viewing was the third biggest share of viewing in a decade.
Every single part of the schedule is profitable. Our evolved strategy will provide us flexibility in how we window our content to optimize our USP as the largest commercial PSB in the UK while supercharging our streaming platform. We have set ourselves stretching targets over the next five years. As I've mentioned before, we're obviously seeing opportunity here to more than double our digital M&A revenues by 2026. We will do that by bringing more viewers to our service and doubling our monthly active users to 20 million by enticing those viewers to spend more time on our platform
[ph]
which we are destination (00:33:14). We plan to double our total streaming consumption to 2 billion hours. By providing a compelling SVOD offering, we intend to double our UK subscriber base to 2.5 million.
Alongside this, we will, of course, ensure that we continue to deliver mass audiences, mass simultaneous audiences and maintain our share of commercial viewing. And finally, let's go to the third and last pillar of our strategy, to expand Studios globally and grow faster than the content market. As you heard at our recent investor seminar, we're confident in our growth trajectory over the next five years. We're building from a position of real strength globally based on our assets and significant progress to-date as I talked about earlier.
We produce now in 13 countries. And in the majority of those markets, we are one of the top three international producer groups. In the UK, we are the biggest. We have strong relationships with all the key buyers. We have a catalog of over 90,000 hours. We have 285 formats globally. We're operating, as you know, in a growth market and strategically pivoting to the key drivers of that growth, in particular streamers and scripted. And we continue to expand our global formats business, aided by a world-class commercial arm.
We offer a very strong creative culture that provides a real competitive edge in attracting and retaining the industry's best creative talent. We are laser-focused on our strategic priorities. We have set out really clear measures of success for our Studios business around growing our scripted business, growing our global formats business, and further diversifying our customer base.
I'm now going to just hand you back to Chris, to go through our plan for investments and cost savings, as well as our capital allocation framework in more detail.
Thanks, Carolyn. To deliver this digital acceleration, we've announced further investments across content, data, and technology funded by our strong cash flows and partly offset by our new program of cost savings. We're confident that by 2026, incremental annual revenue will cover incremental content and non-content investment in ITVX.
So let's start with content. The increase in spend and the move to a single content budget across linear, AVOD and SVOD follows rigorous analysis of both the current and the incremental spend. It reflects both the confidence we have in providing compelling content for our viewers and advertisers as well as the inflation we're seeing in both commissioning and inquiring content. One content budget across all platforms allows us complete flexibility to allocate and calibrate our investment to maximize viewing and revenues.
Our previous guidance for 2022 content investment was £1.16 billion, which now increases by £20 million for additional content for ITVX. The remaining difference between that guidance and the £1.23 billion total content budget is not a further increase in content spend, it's the reclassification of planned BritBox UK content costs from variable costs, reflecting the move to a single content budget. In 2023, we expect to invest £160 million in content for our ITVX, which is partly offset by a reduction in main channel commissions. In total, we expect to spend £1.35 billion, a net increase of £120 million compared to 2022 and for total content spend to continue at around that level going forward.
Now, moving on to non-content investment. Data, technology and streaming costs will increase by £25 million in 2022 and remain at that level in 2023. We expect variable costs of streaming to continue to rise thereafter as viewing and content hours increase. In addition, there will also be one-off costs relating to the launch of ITVX of £20 million in 2022 and £10 million in 2023. We continue to manage our costs tightly and remain on track to deliver £100 million of annualized permanent overhead cost savings over the four years to the end of 2022. To date, we've achieved £83 million worth of permanent savings. And today, we've announced additional permanent savings of a further £50 million by 2026, which we will deliver from continued reductions in broadcast supply chain costs, overheads, property rationalization and further innovation in ITV Studios. These will start from 2023, but we'll be backend-weighted. These permanent savings will fully offset the increase in variable streaming costs.
And finally, I want to set out our approach to capital allocation. Our first priority is investing in the business, in line with our strategic priorities to create shareholder value, as we've set out today. Second, we will continue to manage our financial metrics, consistent with our commitment to investment-grade metrics over the medium term. Third, we want to sustain a regular dividend, which will grow over the medium term. We will continue to consider value-creating M&A opportunities against strict financial and strategic criteria. And finally, any surplus capital will be returned to shareholders.
I'll now hand you back to Carolyn.
Great. Thanks, Chris. In summary, it has required a relentless focus on delivery to execute phase one of the strategy. And now, we are in a strong position to take advantage of the opportunities of evolving viewing and advertising trends and growing demand for quality content globally. With the launch of ITVX in Q4 and strong growth in ITV Studios, we are confident that we will become a leader in UK streaming and an expanding global force in content. Our strong balance sheet and cash flows enables us to invest in this strategy, which we believe will build a more valuable digital media and entertainment company and deliver returns to our shareholders.
Thank you very much for your time, and we will happily take your questions now. Details of how to ask a question via the conference call facility is in our announcement this morning. We will have another Q&A, as you know, with the full M&E team after the seminar. So, please, it would be helpful, I think, if you could focus your questions on core financial and strategic questions. And we will take your more detailed questions on M&E later on.
Thank you.
[Operator Instructions]
Our first question comes from the line of Julien Roch from Barclays. Julien, please go ahead.
Yes. Good morning. Thank you for taking the question. I know, Carolyn, you just said to focus on numbers and not your new strategy. But I had another question this morning on ITVX. So, you said it will be an AVOD-led service with accompanying SVOD proposition combining ITV Hub, ITV Hub+, and BritBox into free and premium content offering. So, will urban BritBox brand disappear for one ITVX with two tiers – free and pay or will you have several brands? If several brands, which one? I think there's still a bit of confusion there.
My second question is can we get the split of the £1.957 billion of TAR between linear and on demand? AVOD is up 41% but we don't know the base. I know you choose not to disclose this as a KPI but you have it, as you report annual growth for the past several years. And I think it would be very useful to have this. And lastly, how much were pure online advertisers ad revenue in full year 2021? And how much did they grew by? I don't see them on page 14. Thank you.
Okay. Just on the brands point. I think it's really, really important just to clarify for you that the brand is ITVX and ITV Hub and Hub+ are no longer brands that we will be promoting. So, they won't exist when ITVX launches at the end of this year. BritBox will still continue very much to exist. The brand of BritBox will be in the ITVX Premium tier, with all of the ad-free content that goes on to the ad-funded ITVX service, as well as any other content partnerships that we do for SVOD only. Is that clearer, Julien?
Yes. So, in a sense, you're merging Hub+ with BritBox. And instead of having three offers, you only will have two, ITVX free and BritBox pay. Is that correct?
No. No. It will be ITVX free and ITVX premium. Within ITVX premium, you will have BritBox, all the other ad-free content that goes on ITVX, you'll get an ad free on premium and any other SVOD content partners that we have will sit in the ITVX premium tier.
Okay.
Okay. Split?
Yeah, on TAR, Julien, what we've announced today is that we're going to – our measure for digital progress is going to be total digital revenue. So that's a combination of AVOD subscriptions, partnership and sponsorship, which is digital-only and a few other digital-only revenue streams. And we think that's the best measure rather than just focusing on AVOD because this is an integrated AVOD and SVOD proposition. And we'll manage it as a single proposition with a single revenue and that will be the digital revenue. So, digital revenue in 2021 was £347 million, and we're saying that we want to take that £750 million by 2026. And sorry, I didn't follow the third question completely.
So, on page 14, you give the breakdown of your advertising by industry or categories and you don't have a category for pure online advertisers, which other broadcasters say is growing like weeds and is now an important part of advertising. So, wanted to know how much it was...
You're right, it is – I wouldn't use the phrase growing like a weed, but it is growing strongly. It was up 28% in 2021 and that's off the back of double-digit growth for several years now. And that's excluding the gambling
[ph]
grants (00:44:35).
How much is it of revenue?
[indiscernible]
(00:44:40-00:44:50)
I'm sorry. Okay. Did you hear that, Julien?
No.
We were just saying – well, did you hear the plus 28% year-on-year, where did we lose you?
Yes, yes.
You heard that. And then we said we actually don't break down pure online brands out of the advertising categories. So, we've never done that.
Okay. All right. Thank you.
Okay. Thanks.
Our next question comes from the line of Jo Barnet-Lamb from Credit Suisse. Jo, please go ahead.
Excellent. Hi, Carolyn. Hi, Chris. Three for me. So firstly, just interested with the sort of broader economic backdrop, the looming cost of living crisis coupled with Ukraine conflict, obviously, very early there. Just interested in any comment that you have from that perspective looking forward.
Secondly, Studios margin for FY 2021 was comparatively weak versus my expectations at least. You've guided that it'll be back in the 13% to 15% range. If you were to normalize for the COVID margin headwinds, where would margin be? I'm just trying to understand how much of the weaker margin is COVID related versus anything that's blend related.
And then thirdly, SDN was meaningfully weak in FY 2021 driven by the ending of those fixed terms and reverting to market prices. And you pointed to that pressure increasing. Can you help us understand how meaningful a headwind that could be for SDN and for how long? Perhaps if you were to normalize all pricing today, what would the run rate revenues be? Thank you very much.
Okay. If I just talk about the economic background, I mean, I think, you know, we've obviously seen a bounce-back post-COVID. That's pretty clear in our numbers, but I think it's actually much more than a bounce back for ITV. I do think there's a lot of self-help in there. Planet V coming into its own, us really deepening partnerships, many more partnerships across the board, sponsorship deals that are not just putting the brand on a program but go much deeper than that. So I think – and, of course, data and analytics, the way we're using that now in a very, very different way to three, four years ago. So I think there has been a bounce back. At the moment, we're seeing no effect from the geopolitical, so none at all. And we're continuing to see advertisers wanting to ensure that they are getting people back into stores, but also shopping online. So, there is pent-up demand and I think advertisers will want to take advantage of that.
The areas that economically and because of logistics and various other things that are not as buoyant are airlines, for obvious reasons, and travel. That hasn't recovered to 2019 levels. But we would expect – what we would have expected without what's happening, the tragic events in Ukraine that, that would have bounced back harder this year. I think probably we'll see some aspects of travel come back this year, but not others. And then car manufacturers, simply because they can't get the parts. So, we do anticipate when that logjam is over that we would start seeing more car manufacturers back on TV. So, I think there are – we obviously monitor this very closely, but at the moment the advertising market is strong.
The cost of living is a very good question. I think that because we're ad funded on free TV, lots and lots of people are staying home quite a lot to watch TV. They've got used to doing that and they actually – so even subscription services, you would say that that is relatively low cost for families compared to a night out at the cinema or night out eating out or whatever, whatever.
So I think that, our view is we're being very realistic about our subscriptions growth going forward. As we said, this is an AVOD-led proposition and has got compelling SVOD content, for people who want BritBox, British content all in one place and ad-free content from the rest of ITVX. But, actually, I think we've been very realistic about that because actually we know that about 66% of households have got two-plus subscriptions and BritBox is already part of that mix, is already a strong part of that mix. Does that answer the economic question? I hope it does.
I'll hand over to Chris for the Studios margin.
Yeah. So, Studios margin, Jo, I'd pretty much, say, all of the under-trend rates margin impact is due to COVID. And that will continue, to a certain extent, next year as well, with still COVID protocols are still in place, obviously, Studios are doing a brilliant job of managing that, and hopefully, they will ease over time, but who knows.
And also you've got that long lead on –
[ph]
FGD (00:49:57) has co-funded a production, that will have been some time ago, based on a budget, some time ago, and those shows will be delivering into 2023 as well. So, underlying absolutely, I would say, I haven't done the forensic maths because you can't but underlying – we would be in that 13% to 15% range this year.
And then on SDN, we're down £3 million in revenue. That pretty much all translates to the bottom line between last year – well, 2020 and 2021. What we've been doing, and this has been a long-term trend. So, as you know – if you like, the unit price of DTT capacity is going down over time, and we have some long-term contracts that will be renewed.
We can offset that by increasing capacity, reselling, and so on, and we've done that quite successfully. So, I can't give you sort of an end-state run rate, because that really depends on how demand for DTT capacity transpires over the next sort of five, six years. But you can continue to see that single-digit revenue decline, I would say, in your modeling is the way to look at that.
Excellent. Thank you both very much.
Our next question comes from the line of Lisa Yang from Goldman Sachs. Lisa, please go head.
Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I have a few. So first is I was just wondering kind of like what's driving that
[indiscernible]
(00:51:34) accelerated investment into digital now. Why now? Is it due to competition? You've seen major change in consumer behavior post-COVID. So just, yeah, wondering what's driving sort of the magnitude of these investments and why now, and how basically that's going to translate into maybe management expenses or operational KPIs? How are you going to be measured against this target?
The second question is on the ad market. Obviously, the advertising has been extremely strong and could just beat your guidance in Q1. How much of that was inflation versus volume-led and how do you see the mix of inflation versus volume evolving throughout the rest of the year?
[indiscernible]
(00:52:18) inflation has been quite – I mean very, very high. So just wondering, yeah, if you think that business is stable.
And the third question is on those new digital revenues. So you're saying the revenues will offset investments by 2026, but how should we think about the longer-term margin profile of the digital revenue, the £750 million you talked about? What's the sort of margin we should expect versus your existing broadcast margin? Thank you.
Okay. Well, look, if I start with the first thing, why now? And the answer is pretty clear: we are in the best position to do this now. We have spent the last three years delivering on our digital milestones; improving ITV Hub significantly; really, really understanding subscription; and driving subscription through BritBox and Hub+ Understanding viewers on VODs, Planet V, which, three years ago, we didn't even have. We now have over 1,000 clients and advertisers using Planet V and growing, and we're linked into all the big agency groups.
So, we are now in a position where we really understand what viewers are looking for and we're in a very strong position. We have developed our digital capabilities. So, in data and analytics, three years ago, we had nothing. Today, we have a strong team with a CDO who you will hear from later. We will have about 100 people who really understand data science, AI.
By the end of this year, our tech team has grown from about 100, 150 to 300 in order to have the capability to deliver all the output on digital. So, we are confident that this is the right time.
We also really understand what content works on streaming and what content works on subscriptions. So we've now got two years, three years of experience of dealing with all of this. And we're doing it from a position of strength. We have a strong balance sheet. We've built that back up post-COVID, and it's very important to us to give returns to shareholders. And we believe by doing this now, we will be returning value to shareholders completely. We will be building a more valuable company in the medium term – not even in the long term; in the medium term. So that's why now.
Anything to add to that?
No, no.
So ad market, you were talking about inflation versus volume, weren't you? That was the question.
Yes.
Yeah.
How much? Yes.
Yeah. And Lisa, as you know, we are regulated. So, station average price is an outcome of demand and availability. And, yes, advertisers have seen inflation. But they've seen ad inflation across the market generally and other forms of video advertising have also inflated.
And despite that inflation, when you look at it, TV is still by far and away the best ROI. It's proven to work. I think Kelly did a great job in the back end of last year in the commercial seminar, explaining why advertisers come back to TV again and again. So there is inflation in the market, but we still think we are the best ROI medium if you want a video campaign and it's proving to work.
And going back to Julien's earlier question around online brands, there's a reason those brands use TV as heavily as they do, it's because they see both the immediate impact of performance as well as the long-term brand-building capability.
And just one thing to add to that is that unlike many other media owners, TV has a set amount of minutage. And so, in terms of volume, the volume is the volume on ITV one, if that makes sense.
Yeah. And then just in terms of margin, digital versus linear, the dynamics are the same. We've got a fixed cost of the platform. In linear, you've got the fixed cost of distribution. In digital, you've fixed cost of the platform. There are some variable costs, but they're relatively minor. And then every incremental ad dollar is incremental profit, so it's highly operationally geared.
And that's why Carolyn said earlier, we're building a really valuable business because having the ability to do both mass reach and programmatic on a single platform, so extending reach in a mass reach campaign or doing targeted, if that's what advertisers want, it's an incredibly valuable proposition. And as I said, the more inventory we add, the more viewing we get, that doubling of mouse. All of that incremental ad revenue is incremental profit.
I think we've got time for maybe one more question before we give you all a break and then come back at 10:15 for the Investor Seminar.
Perfect. So, our final question will be from the line of Omar Sheikh from Morgan Stanley. Omar, please proceed.
Hi, everyone.
Hi.
I'm just going to sneak in three quick ones on ITVX. I'll keep them strategic.
So, first of all, Carolyn, I don't whether you want to share how much content of incremental investment you were making into ITVX is going to be on content which you can only see on the platform. Just kind of how much exclusive content will be available on ITVX if I try take up? And then sort of, I guess, related to that, are there any commitments on ITV Studios supply into ITVX that are any different from what you currently have? That's the first question.
And secondly, thinking about what the revenue mix of ITVX might be long term, so once you build the business post 2026, obviously it's going to be predominantly advertising-funded. But can you give us a sense of – is that 70%, 80% advertising? Is it 40%, 50%? What's the kind of the revenue mix that we should think about?
And then, finally, are you thinking about any sort of potential international opportunities for ITVX once you've built the UK business? Thanks.
Okay. So, let me answer the question on content. You'll hear lots more about this in the seminar, so I'm going to be brief in this response, which is the best way to think about this is that the incremental investments that we've announced today will be digital-first investment. That means it will go on ITVX, not on linear.
And therefore, when Kevin talks later and
[ph]
Rod (00:59:05) talk later about the 52 original weekly drops, so premieres, that will go every single week on ITVX, that will only be available on ITVX, not on linear, not on any other channel, not on any other streamer. It will only be available on ITVX ad-free on the premium tier, if you want it, but ad-funded for anyone who wants to come in to ITVX.
So that's one of those things. FAST channels will also be on ITVX ad-funded, and they will go into far more detail about this further into today. So I'm going to leave it at that.
On Studios, it's a very good question. Obviously, being an integrated producer broadcaster gives us a great advantage here. And what we have said is that as an absolute floor, the Studios labels, of which there are 60 in our group, will get about 50% of these commissions. So it's a minimum of 50% for ITV Studios. So there is an obvious group benefit to ITVX as well.
Revenue mix, are you going to hazard a guess on this?
Well, I mean...
It's obviously not a guess.
No, it's not.
It's a granular answer.
I mean, what we've said is we aim to double subscribers and to double viewing, which is a good proxy for AVOD revenue as well. So, we're sort of assuming that the mix is broadly the same. And if you look at 2021, we had revenue of £42 million, which is slightly over 10% of total digital. So that should give you a flavor for the weight of advertising versus subscriber.
And on the international opportunities, we see ITVX as very much about Britain. This is us as the kind of – a very large national player. This is how we're going to be a leading UK streamer. It's about the UK.
Our international ambitions are all about our joint venture with BBC, BritBox International, which is doing very, very well, as you've heard, and is rolling out into many more markets as we speak. So, Nordics to come. So, that's where we will focus our attention internationally.
Brilliant. Thanks very much.
Now, on that note, if there are- I'm going to stop questions now, give you all a break for 15 minutes and thank you very much for those questions. If there are any other outstanding questions, of course, you can ask Chris and I these at the M&E seminar. We will all be regrouping in 15 minutes. So, see you very shortly.