BBC strengthens its brand in Australia

BBC Worldwide is to launch a premium BBC channel in Australia on Foxtel, offering premiere British drama and comedy, ad-break free and as close to UK transmission as possible, advance-television.com reports.

Launching as part of the Foxtel Drama & Lifestyle package in mid-2014, the channel will feature first-run programming from the BBC and other British producers, which will not be available on terrestrial television for at least 12 months.

The deal will also see the four existing BBC channels – UKTV, BBC Knowledge, CBeebies and BBC World News – continuing on the Foxtel platform.

All five channels will be available on Foxtel GO and the premiere channel will be available in HD, alongside UKTV and BBC Knowledge. Extensive BBC content will be available on demand at no extra charge and subscribers to the channels will be able to go back in time using the Foxtel EPG to watch or record programmes they have missed.