BBC Worldwide will launch “BBC News and Sport apps on several platforms in the next few months”, BBC.com MD and EVP Luke Bradley-Jones (pictured) has told us.
“It’s very unlikely we’ll move to a charge basis for our generalist news services” — but audience-specific apps will come at a price, for example, “if you’re creating a specialist soccer app forAsia-Pacific”. “We see a much higher willingness to pay for content (on mobile). “We’re going to test a couple of pricepoints … it’s likely to be in the region of the CNN.com app” ($2).
The public-service UK BBC has so far been unable to join the apps bandwagon due to disagreements on terms with app store vendors. But: “We have slightly more freedom internationally because we don’t have the same market impact issues (as in the UK)”, Bradley-Jones said.
BBCWW already has an commercial iPhone live TV app for the BBC World News TV channel, built by Livestation.