Understand the structure and Ownership of the media sector

TV has rapidly become one of the most influential forms of prominent media with a number as high as 98% of households within the UK owning a TV. This shows the significant effect broadcasts have within individuals within this time period. TV is split into two Ownership's, Public and Private Ownership. A Public broadcasting company is BBC whereas a Private broadcasting is companies such as Sky and ITV. 

A Public Ownership company is the BBC, this is public due to the company being funded by the Government, with this is the TV License. Households pay their TV License in which almost entirely the money goes straight to the BBC to pay for their broadcasting services. Radio, Television and Internet Services. Due to the BBC being Governmentally ran, it is their duty to identify and meet the publics interests in terms of their media intake. The public are the source of the companies income, they rely on the payment of the TV license to support their funds. The Public are able to complain and give feedback to the BBC in which they will then follow this up and make any possible changes. This is important for the BBC due to their company being ran purely based around the Public. Due to the BBC being publicly based, no adverts get broadcasted throughout their programmes due to the advertisement fee. Being a Public Ownership company has its advantages, due to the BBC running on the basis of the publics interests this means a wide range of programmes are being broadcast to suit the different audiences. 

This further leads to a huge mass amount of audiences watching the different programmes which are targeted at them. This lastly then leads to a high reputation standard. If the BBC did not base their company around the public then any kind of programme would be getting broadcast to an audience which isn't available. However disadvantages are applicable to being a public ownership due to a high majority of people willing to subscribe to companies such as 'Virgin Media' and 'Sky' which allows them to access all channels which the BBC doesn't. The TV license just covers all the BBC broadcasting channels. The BBC is an independent company due to them owning everything themselves, they don't converge with any other companies to make them a media conglomerate. 

The BBC use cross media convergence by advertising products such as BBC Big Weekend within a newspaper or another form of advertisement. They use their products and their channels to their advantage to gain a higher audience knowledge of the upcoming event taking place. The BBC is a vertical integrated company, this is due to themselves being the producer, distributor and exhibition of the product. This allows them to entirely keep the funds and receive all the profits. 

The BBC have a wide range of product diversity, throughout the day they can show programmes such as 'Pointless' which would then differ to the programmes shown within the evening. This could be programmes such as Broadchurch. This shows the diversity used as it differs from 'lifestyle' programmes to drama programmes. Competition is a major issue for the BBC as other companies such as Sky have more to offer with their diverse range of programmes being broadcasted. More people are willing to subscribe to products such as Virgin Media and Sky due to them having incentives on top such as the ability to use Catch Up. 

Private media ownership is companies such as Sky, this is funded simply by advertising. Therefore private ownerships are more able to satisfy the companies shareholders rather that the publics interests. Companies which are privately owned tend to have a more of a varied channel choice, this gives the audience more of a wider range of what interests them which then boosts the companies reputation and financial income. You tend to find that private channels have a narrowed down target audience they can aim at, an example of this is MTV which is aimed at 16-24. The advertisements broadcasted on this channel would then be different than they would be on Discovery Channel. However, BBC is targeted at all types of audiences which means the programmes being viewed would have a higher variety. 

Sky is a media Conglomerate, it is 40% owned by 21st Century Fox which has over 10 million subscribers within the Uk making it the largest satellite broadcasting company in the Country. Sky is a media conglomerate due to them merging with other companies to benefit themselves, News Corporation is the main company owning other companies within itself. Rupert Murdoch is the founder of these companies, this means the majority of the income is entirely his. They have a wide product diversity as they broadcast channels such as Challenge, Pick, Fox News and all of the Sky Channels. This makes the companies reputation higher which turns into a higher revenue. Sky advertise some of their upcoming or current TV programmes on other channels such as ITV, this is due to ITV having a higher viewing audience however Sky have a higher income due to their variety of channels. Sky's main success within revenue is the fact they have been able to garner with TV rights for the English Premier League with Sky sports. 



The big advantage of Private Ownership is that as it runs purely on advertising funds which means they can focus on their advertisement in order to gain a high income. This means that the higher popularity of the shows and the channels means more money it will cost to advertise during these times and then this means the more money the channel will get to fund more and a wider range of shows. A disadvantage to private ownership is that as the BBC is a publicly owned company, before creating a new show they spend a lot of revenue on research to find out exactly what TV show would be popular before they even fund a show. Whereas with a private channel they wouldn't know their target audience and then their show could be a flop. Private media ownership can result in better quality products due to the competition, the companies are constantly fighting to get their product to be as best as possible and as unique as possible. The threat of losing market share to a competitor makes them put forth their best products. Private Ownerships are not owned by the Government which allows any official sources to be shared to create a higher income. Sky is a horizontally integrated company

Within Broadcasting companies horizontal and vertical integration exists, horizontal integration is the strategy where a company acquires or creates production units for outputs which are alike, either competitive or complementary to one another. They expand into areas of one industry to develop within a certain area of production or they can buy out another company that deals with these areas. This means they rely on other companies as well as themselves to either produce, advertise, distribute or exhibit their product. This could then further lead to a higher income as more knowledge and ideas are being achieved. An example of this is Sky, they could create a product by themselves but they could then get another company to help them to distribute it in order to get higher recognition.

"We have a well-established and comprehensive approach to engaging with our stakeholders. We seek views from our stakeholders to help us shape our individual initiatives as well as our overall approach. This includes customers, our people, policy makers, experts from our industry, the sustainability sector and non-government organisations. We use this feedback to help us meet our stakeholder expectations in evolving our strategy, initiatives and reporting." This is a statement on Sky's website, this implies how the company use Stakeholders to share intellectual knowledge to better their products.

This is an example of Sky using their advertising techniques within a newspaper, this is commonly known as cross convergence due to them working with another media company to promote a product.

Competition is not a major threat to companies such as Sky due to their mass income and readily available audience, due to them being purely based on advertisement this is how they gain their revenue. Unlike the BBC who have major competition such as Sky, they have space to enter into new markets with different ideas and with not much to lose due to their large audience.