The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is investigating suspected anti-competitive behaviour relating to the hiring of freelance TV crew by the BBC, ITV and a number of indie production companies.
The authority said it is probing “suspected breaches of competition law” by the BBC, ITV Hartswood Films, Hat Trick Productions, Red Planet, Sister Pictures and Tiger Aspect Productions.
The probe is “in relation to the purchase of freelance services and the employment of staff supporting the production, creation and/or broadcasting of television content in the UK, excluding sport content.”
The CMA said it has reasonable grounds to suspect one or more breaches of competition law, without providing specific details. It does not say why the companies, which are all active in the drama production space, have been named.
In a statement, the CMA said it has not reached a view as to whether there is sufficient evidence of an infringement of competition law for it to issue a statement of objections to any of the companies. It stressed that not all cases result in the CMA issuing a statement of objections.
The CMA is separately investigating suspected breaches of competition law relating to similar breaches of competition law in sports production and broadcasting.
You are not signed in
Only registered users can comment on this article.
Big Blue Marble to run PoC for MoQ
Austrian media technology company Big Blue Marble has announced a multi-month proof of concept (PoC) for media over QUIC (MoQ) during a major international football championship.
M2M Media joins SRT Alliance
M2A Media, a cloud-native live video distribution platform, has joined the SRT Alliance.
Global FAST viewing grew 55% in 2026, Amagi reports
Amagi, a provider of an agentic industry cloud platform for unified broadcast, streaming, and monetisation, has announced the June 2026 edition of its Airtime Report, the company’s quarterly analysis of global FAST trends.
Synamedia appoints new CEO
Synamedia has appointed Tzvi Gerstl as its CEO. Gerstl will replace Paul Segre, who is moving to the role of Executive Chairman.
Bitcentral splits in two
Bitcentral has created two separate media technology companies: Bitcentral and ViewNexa. Both companies are now operating independently under their new structures.
.jpg)
