Tony Iffland
Tony Iffland was appointed General Manager of BBC Worldwide Australia in July 2009. He is responsible for the coordination of BBC Worldwide’s seven divisions and for the implementation of an Australasian business strategy, as well as for regulatory and governance issues affecting the company in this region.
He also chairs the newly-created Australian Operations Board, which has been created to ensure a cohesive approach to brand and business strategy, and which comprises representatives from BBC Worldwide’s wholly-owned subsidiaries as well as from its joint-venture partners.
Tony’s GM role is in addition to his substantive post as General Manager, BBC Worldwide Channels Australasia, to which he was appointed in July 2008. He oversees the five channels within the BBC portfolio – UKTV, BBC World News, BBC HD, BBC Knowledge and CBeebies.
Chief Executive of UKTV since 1995, Tony is responsible for all aspects of the channels’ day-to-day management, and leads the launch of new channels into the Australian and New Zealand markets.
Tony is active in Subscription TV industry affairs and is Vice President of the board of ASTRA (Australian Subscription Television and Radio Association). He represents the interests of the Subscription TV Channels on this peak industry body and chairs the ASTRA Channel Providers Committee. He also chairs the CBeebies Advisory Council, the body created in 2009 to provide a platform for regulatory and content issues around children’s television programming.
Prior to joining UKTV, Tony worked for over 14 years collectively with BBC Worldwide’s Australian office, including three years in the UK working on the launch of UK Gold, one of BBC Worldwide’s joint-venture channels with Virgin Media.
BBC Worldwide Limited is the main commercial arm and a wholly owned subsidiary of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). The company exists to maximise the value of the BBC’s assets for the benefit of the licence fee payer and invest in public service programming in return for rights.
The company has seven core businesses: Channels, Content & Production, Digital Media, Sales & Distribution, Magazines, Home Entertainment and Global Brands. In 2008/09, BBC Worldwide generated profits of £102.6 million (before exceptionals) on sales of over £1 billion.
