Sky 1 HDâ€™s Mad Dogs was one of four UK-produced Sky

AnnuAl review 2011BRITISH SKY BROADCASTING GROUP PLC8

At Sky, we believe our customers deserve the very best entertainment and communications experience. So we work hard to get better every single year. That means more high-quality content, faster innovation and great value, all backed up by a strong commitment to customer service.

SUPERCHARGING THE CUSTOMER ExPERIENCE

Sky 1 HD’s Mad Dogs was one of four UK-produced Sky entertainment programmes to be nominated for a BAFTA Television Award in 2011

AnnuAl review 2011BRITISH SKY BROADCASTING GROUP PLC

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Alongside a great choice of high-quality programmes, we strive to constantly improve the whole experience of watching television. That’s why we’ve added more HD channels and launched Europe’s first 3D channel. And because our customers lead busy lives, we’re helping to make TV fit around them. Thanks to new services like Sky Anytime+ and Sky Go, they can watch what they want, when they want, where they want.

In these tough times, it’s all the more important to offer customers outstanding value for money. So all of this is available every month

for the same price as taking a family out for a single meal. And we also offer great value home communications, giving our customers the potential to save hundreds of pounds when they switch to Sky Broadband and Sky Talk.

As you’d expect, our whole offering is underpinned by our commitment to service. We’re investing to make the customer experience easier, more efficient and more enjoyable than ever.

Sky 1 HD’s Mad Dogs was one of four UK-produced Sky entertainment programmes to be nominated for a BAFTA Television Award in 2011

SUPERCHARGING THE CUSTOMER ExPERIENCE continued


Game of Thrones, Sky Atlantic HD

Fuelling passionsGiving customers a better choice of TV is key to the growth of our business. We know people will only choose Sky if we provide something they value. So we give customers programmes they’re really passionate about, whatever their interest. Over the last year, we’ve continued to develop our traditional areas of strength in sport, movies and news. To build on this solid foundation, we’re also strengthening our entertainment proposition by investing in more original British programmes, together with the best content from around the world.

This is good news for our customers because it means an ever greater choice of high-quality programmes. And it’s good news for the creative economy too. We now spend £380 million a year on the origination and production of British content, excluding our investment in sports rights. And we expect that figure to increase by more than 50% to £600 million a year by 2014.


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ENTERTAINMENTWe’ve always provided a wide range of high-quality entertainment. But our customers tell us they want even more choice. So we’re taking our investment to an entirely different scale, allowing us to bring them more of the best drama, comedy and arts.

Home-grown content resonates strongly with our customers, so we’re making a significant push to create more original British entertainment. In the last year, Sky 1 HD has continued to bring viewers new British drama including our adaptation of Martina Cole’s The Runaway and Thorne, a new crime thriller starring David Morrissey. Another drama highlight was the psychological thriller, Mad Dogs, which featured an outstanding cast including John Simm and Philip Glenister and was one of four UK-produced Sky entertainment programmes to be nominated for a BAFTA Television Award.

Alongside original drama, we’ve begun a major commitment to original British comedy. Our first new British comedy, Little Crackers, aired last Christmas and featured some of the UK’s best-loved comedy performers, including Catherine Tate, Dawn French and Stephen Fry. There will be more original comedy to follow over the next year as several new productions reach the screen. Other Sky 1 HD highlights have included a new series of the popular panel show, A League of Their Own, and the premiere of An Idiot Abroad starring Karl Pilkington, which achieved some of the channel’s best ever audiences.

We have maintained our commitment to offer the best US programmes. Our new channel, Sky Atlantic HD, launched in February and is the new UK home of HBO, which is renowned as the creator of some of the best television ever made. Sky Atlantic HD has offered outstanding new shows like Boardwalk Empire and Game of Thrones, as well as classics like The Sopranos and The Wire, and is already rated by nearly a quarter of customers as one of their top channels. We have also added further breadth to our entertainment portfolio by acquiring and relaunching Sky Living HD, offering a strong appeal to female audiences with shows such as Britain & Ireland’s Next Top Model.

In addition to investment in our wholly-owned channels, we continue to support the channel partners which make a valued contribution to our content offering. By investing more than £350 million a year with broadcasters such as Discovery, History, National Geographic and UKTV, we are able to bring customers breadth and depth of choice that they can’t find on free-to-air TV.

Little Crackers, Sky 1 HD

Britain & Ireland’s Next Top Model, Sky Living HD

An Idiot Abroad, Sky 1 HD

Birth of Britain, Nat Geo HD



The South Bank Sky Arts Awards 2011

ARTS We want to provide everyone with content they love. Millions of people love the arts, but arts programmes on television were traditionally few and far between and often shown only at the dead of night. That was until Sky Arts came along. Now broadcasting 48 hours of arts coverage every day, our four arts channels remain the only place on TV to enjoy the whole range of arts and culture, from ballet to rock concerts. Our unique coverage is now enjoyed by over 2.4 million customers every month.

This year, we’ve increased the depth and breadth of our arts and culture programming. The Book Show has gone on the road to five literary festivals, including the Hay Festival. We’ve worked with Melvyn Bragg to give the South Bank Awards a new home after leaving ITV. We’ve beamed live music into millions of homes, including the first ever 3D music festival from the Isle of Wight. Sky Arts At... went backstage to show viewers what it’s really like behind the scenes at a range of arts organisations. Art of Survival is challenging four artistic adventurers to perform their way across Europe. And not content with bringing live theatre back to British television last year, we’ve now broadcast the world’s first ever live 3D opera from ENO.

The next step is to build on this success. And thanks to a planned tripling of the Sky Arts budget, we’ll be able to offer our customers an even better range of arts and culture in the years to come.

Songbook: KT Tunstall, Sky Arts HD

The Book Show, Sky Arts HD


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Avatar, Sky Movies HD

MOVIES Sky Movies aims to be the only movies service that you’ll ever need. From Hollywood blockbusters and cult classics to independent films, we pride ourselves on the breadth of choice that our 12 dedicated movie channels offer, all in HD. Sky Movies offers customers over 450 different movies a week including brand new premieres every Friday. Over the past year, over 90% of the top 100 box office hits were shown on Sky Movies before any other TV channel.

As well as showing the widest range of the newest films, we’ve continued to offer great insider movie coverage. We showed extensive live coverage from the Golden Globes and the Academy Awards. And we’ve been there, with the stars on the red carpet, at the biggest premieres.

Building on the success of our online movies service, the launch of Sky Anytime+ brought on-demand to the main TV set, opening up a whole new way for our customers to watch hundreds of films at the touch of a button at no additional cost. And, as an extra reward, we give away thousands of cinema tickets every week to Sky Movies customers.

Sky Movies has also taken its first significant step into original production by commissioning Neverland, a new prequel to the Peter Pan story. With an outstanding cast including Rhys Ifans, Keira Knightley and Bob Hoskins, this mini-series will premiere later this year exclusively on Sky Movies.

Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang, Sky Movies HD

The Oscars® 2011, Sky Movies Premiere HD



Sky News’ Special Correspondent, Alex Crawford

NEWS The last 12 months have seen some of the biggest news stories of recent times and Sky News has been at the forefront of them. Internationally, we have seen revolution across the Middle East, a tsunami in Japan and the death of Osama Bin Laden. At home there have been major events in the shape of the Pope’s visit to the UK, demonstrations over tuition fees and a Royal Wedding. Sky News delivered memorable coverage for all of them and was once again named the Royal Television Society (RTS) News Channel of the Year – for a record eighth time. Judges commented that it was a “vintage year for Sky News which exhibited outstanding range and depth”.

In addition, Sky News’ Special Correspondent, Alex Crawford, won the RTS Television Journalist of the Year accolade for an unprecedented third time and its coverage of the student riots won the award in the Home News category. Two awards for Sky’s international coverage followed in June at the Monte Carlo Golden Nymph Awards – both for the outstanding reporting of events during the Arab Spring.

The ground-breaking Sky News for iPad was also launched this year. The app, supported by a dedicated editorial team, allows users to control their own interactive news service with live video, expert analysis and rich graphics.

Live coverage of the Royal Wedding

Anna Botting presenting live from Japan


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Rory McIlroy, US Open 2011, Sky Sports HD

SPORTS Sky Sports marked its 20th anniversary this year by providing depth, breadth and quality of coverage to satisfy the most passionate sports fans. With more than 1,000 outside broadcasts a year, we now offer 20 times the amount of live sport shown on terrestrial TV 20 years ago. Among the many endorsements of Sky Sports’ broad contribution over two decades, former BBC1 controller Sir Paul Fox reflected: “Sky has changed the history of sport and of sports broadcasting”.

Highlights of the year on Sky Sports included Rory McIlroy’s triumph in the US Open golf and Europe’s unforgettable victory in the 2010 Ryder Cup at Celtic Manor, which also marked the launch of our 3D channel to residential customers. We also offered our first live coverage of The Masters from Augusta, with all four days shown live in HD and for the first time in 3D. In our biggest ever season of football, an exciting finish to the Barclays Premier League helped to draw our best audiences for more than 10 years, while Sky Sports was chosen as host broadcaster for the UEFA Champions League final at Wembley. In Rugby Union, we showed a live match every week of the year, including a classic Heineken Cup Final that attracted our highest ever audience for a domestic club match. England’s victory in the Ashes series in Australia was part of a packed 49-week calendar of cricket, also including every match played in the ICC World Cup. And Sky Sports continued to provide valuable exposure to sports like netball, speedway and women’s cricket.

All of our five sports channels can now be enjoyed in high definition following the launch of Sky Sports News HD, which coincided with a move to all-new studios in the Sky Studios complex. While our investments have a big impact on screen, they make just as much difference off screen, providing vital funding and support for sport at all levels. And our programmes – supporting young people in schools, encouraging more people to cycle regularly and training more cricket coaches – are all playing their part in helping to improve lives through the power of sport.

Women’s Twenty20 cricket, Sky Sports HD

Heineken Cup Final 2011, Sky Sports HD



Pushing boundariesAt Sky, we believe in innovating both on and off the screen. It’s not just about the choice of programming that customers can watch – it’s also about constantly improving the way they can watch it. That’s why, this year, we’ve made it possible to watch more of our programmes in high definition and added a new dimension to television by bringing 3D into our customers’ homes.

And it’s why new services like Sky Anytime+ and Sky Go are making it possible for customers to watch what they want, when they want, where they want.

Flying Monsters 3D, Sky 3D


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SETTING THE PACE OF CHANGESky has set the pace of change ever since we revolutionised British television by introducing satellite broadcasting back in 1989. Along the way, we’ve found that continuous change doesn’t just help keep existing customers satisfied, it also creates new reasons for people to join Sky and take more products from us.

One of those reasons has been our digital video recorder, Sky+. For 10 years, it has been allowing viewers to take control of their TV experience and, like all the best innovations, it is incredibly simple to use. Today, more than 8 million of our homes use Sky+ to control their viewing – and between them they use Sky+ a billion times a month. If you added all that viewing together and thought of it as a channel in its own right, it would be the most popular channel on the entire Sky platform.

Another reason for our growth is HD. When HD was first introduced, some were sceptical that it would ever take-off. But we saw substantial potential for our customers to enjoy a higher quality viewing experience and for us to establish a new source of growth for our business. That was why we took the decision to invest early and lead the HD revolution.

Today, more than 3.8 million customers have upgraded to our HD service and the technology is widely regarded as a new standard for quality. As demand for HD continues to grow, we’ve continued to improve our market-leading service by introducing more HD content. There are now more than 50 HD channels available to Sky customers – far more than on any other platform.

Sky+HD offers more than 50 HD channels

Sky Anytime+ opens up a library of TV on demand



Technical trials for the launch of Sky’s 3D channel

A NEW DIMENSION IN TELEVISIONFollowing the success of HD, we’re now taking a similar approach with 3D. One of the many great things about the Sky+HD box is that it is 3D-ready. And in October, we launched Europe’s first 3D channel into customers’ homes.

As well as bringing 3D movies like Avatar and the Toy Story trilogy from the big screen to the small screen, we’re also producing more of our own 3D content. We’ve now covered over 120 live sports events in 3D and our technological capability was one reason why UEFA chose Sky Sports as the host broadcaster for the Champions League Final in May 2011. We’ve also applied our skills in 3D production to the world’s first live 3D opera: the ENO’s production of Lucrezia Borgia, directed by Mike Figgis. And there was another first this summer as we broadcast the world’s first 3D music festival live from the Isle of Wight. This followed on from a spectacular 3D broadcast of Kylie’s Aphrodite tour at the O2.

Equally, our commitment to pushing boundaries in 3D opened up the opportunity to work for the first time with Sir David Attenborough, a distinguished broadcaster with a track record of using new technology. Sir David worked with us to produce the natural history documentary, Flying Monsters 3D, which became the first 3D programme to win a BAFTA Television Award. And he has a number of other exciting projects in the pipeline for Sky 3D.

Lucrezia Borgia, Sky 3D

Toy Story 3, Sky 3D


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ANYTIME, ANYWHEREOf course, innovation isn’t just about making the picture quality better. People increasingly want to be able to watch their favourite programmes when and where it suits them. And we have to make sure we can meet those expectations.

Following on from the success of Sky+, we’ve launched Sky Anytime+, our brand new video on demand service allowing customers to access a library of TV on demand at no extra monthly cost, including box sets and movies to watch whenever they like. It takes advantage of Sky’s state-of-the-art broadband network, which is well suited to delivering high-bandwidth video services to Sky+HD boxes.

We’re also providing more convenience beyond the living room by connecting customers to our content wherever they are. This summer, we launched Sky Go, which allows customers to watch their favourite channels on their laptops, tablets and smartphones. And, following our acquisition this year of the leading public Wi-Fi network, The Cloud, customers will soon be able to enjoy easy access to our content on the move at thousands of hotspots across the UK.

We’re also taking advantage of new platforms and devices to offer a different kind of content experience. Sky is a leader in mobile content, with four of our apps featuring in the UK’s 20 most popular. Our Sky+ app provides customers with the Sky Electronic Programme Guide in their pocket, allowing them to remotely send Sky+ recording requests to their boxes at home.

Earlier this year, we launched our most ambitious app yet: Sky News for iPad. Designed specifically to make the most of the iPad’s functionality, the app gives users a new way to get their news by mixing live and on-demand video with expert analysis and rich interactive graphics. It all makes for unprecedented control and flexibility that allows users to fully immerse themselves in the stories they choose. So far, it has been downloaded 300,000 times.

The launch of Sky Go, summer 2011

Sky is now enjoyed on a range of devices

Sky offers a range of mobile apps



More than 700,000 joined Sky Talk this year

Connecting peopleWe’re always looking for new ways to bring our customers more value. Sky Broadband and Sky Talk are two of the ways we’re doing so. Sky is now about much more than TV. More and more customers are taking advantage of the opportunity to save money and get a great quality service when they switch their broadband and home phone services to Sky. With a total of over 9 million home communications products now sold, we are the fastest growing broadband and telephony provider in the UK.


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Truly unlimited broadband

SWITCH AND SAVESky Broadband enjoyed another great year. In the current economic environment, our value proposition is resonating strongly. And our simple, easy and reliable broadband service attracted over 700,000 new customers, bringing the overall total number of customers to 3.3 million.

This success has been driven by understanding what customers are looking for from their broadband service, and then making sure we deliver it. Research told us that what broadband users want above all else is value for money and a consistent service. So that’s what we’ve worked hard to offer and to communicate through a marketing campaign which shows people how they can save money and get a great service when they switch to Sky.

Our award-winning broadband packages offer reliable services of up to 20Mb speeds from just £7.50 a month. And our network maintains consistent and fast traffic speeds, even during busy times. What’s more, we’ve added more value by making our video on demand service, Sky Anytime+ available to customers who take both broadband and TV from us.

Great value also describes the two call packages available through Sky Talk. Our basic line rental package costs less than BT’s monthly price – and for an extra £5 a month, customers can get unlimited calls to UK landlines at any time of the day.

Our customers recognised this, with more than 700,000 switching to Sky Talk this year, bringing the total number of users to 3.1 million. And independent surveys show they are delighted with the service. Sky Talk virtually swept the board in the uSwitch Home Phone Customer Satisfaction Awards, earning the best scores in nine out of the ten categories and emerging as the service that customers were most likely to recommend to friends.

Over a quarter of our customers now take all three of TV, broadband and talk from us. And our home communications products are also resonating with customers who don’t yet take Sky TV. We began offering Sky Broadband and Sky Talk as standalone products in summer 2010 and, so far, this has attracted more than 100,000 new customers. With millions more customers yet to make the switch, we see a big opportunity for continued growth.

3.3 million Sky Broadband customers

Sky Talk won nine uSwitch Awards



Our customer advisors are multi-skilled so they can resolve queries first time

SuperservingIn a customer-focused business like Sky, we never lose sight of the people who matter most – our customers.Over the past year, we’ve invested substantially to make the customer experience easier, more efficient and more enjoyable than ever. And we’ve spent a lot of time listening to and talking with our customers to understand how we can serve them better.


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PROVIDING GREAT SERVICEOur customers expect great service and we want to ensure we can provide it. That’s why, this year, we’ve opened new contact centres in Stockport and Sheffield to work alongside our existing facilities in Scotland. In part, they’re a natural response to our growing customer base and increased take-up of our different products. But increasing our regional presence also means we will be able to develop specialist teams to deal with the most complex queries, as well as allowing more of our customers to speak to a UK-based advisor.

When they do call us, there’s nothing more frustrating for customers than being passed around. That’s why we’ve introduced smarter phone routing and provided 300,000 hours of training that empowers advisors to resolve an increasingly diverse range of queries, first time. Over the past year, we’ve also run 120 road shows to ensure all our 12,000 contact centre advisors are up to speed with the latest developments when they deal with customer queries.

One such development has been our Home Movers service. Moving house can be stressful, but we’ve lifted one burden from our customers’ shoulders by making transferring their Sky services as straightforward as we can. With one call, our dedicated team will manage the whole process for customers and, best of all, they’ll do it for free.

We appreciate that not everyone wants to call when they have a problem. That’s why customers can now also chat to an advisor through our website and we also have advisors on social media networks like Facebook and Twitter to deal quickly with questions. It’s never been easier to get in touch. And the online Sky Help Forum even allows customers to help other customers.

Because we’re always looking for new ways to improve our products and service, we actively encourage people from all parts of our business to spend time listening to and talking with customers. Through our Customer Closeness programme, our staff have the opportunity to accompany engineers on home visits, spend time listening in on calls to our contact centres and take part in customer focus groups. As a result, over 4,500 Sky people have now gained new insights by taking part in at least one of our Customer Closeness activities.

It’s important to us that all our customers can enjoy our service to the full, so we’ve taken more steps to make our products more accessible. More than 100 specialist advisors work in a dedicated service team for customers with disabilities. On screen, we now provide over 400,000 hours of subtitling a year and this year we have also introduced the new Sky Talker. Designed in partnership with RNIB, it makes it easier for visually impaired customers to choose what to watch by allowing them to hear some of the text that appears on screen and vocalising the programme synopsis and Sky+ functionality.

New contact centre in Stockport

One of our 2,500 Sky Engineers

We offer a free Home Movers service

Sky Talker assists visually impaired customers

Sky 1 HDâ€™s Mad Dogs was one of four UK-produced Sky

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Transcript of Sky 1 HDâ€™s Mad Dogs was one of four UK-produced Sky