£360m crisis hits ITV digital

Bosses at ITV Digital warned yesterday that the service may fold unless it can cut the price of broadcasting Nationwide League soccer and Sky TV programmes.

Granada and Carlton have ploughed almost £800million into the joint venture but they need a further £360mil-lion to keep going.

The companies said ITV Digital needed fundamental restructuring 'as a matter of urgency' to secure its future.

They were also reviewing the 48 channels offered by the subscription service. Despite the best efforts of glove puppet mascot Monkey and his side-kick Johnny Vegas in advertising the terrestrial digital service, it has suffered a slump in advertising compounded by fierce competition from Rupert Murdoch's BSkyB satellite service.

Although subscribers rose by 46,000 to 1.3million in the last quarter of 2001, almost a quarter of customers leave the service within a year of joining.

In contrast, BSkyB has 5.7million subscribers - about 218,000 signed up in the last three months of last year. Analysts fear the crisis at ITV Digital will turn into a repeat of the BSB debacle.

British Satellite Broadcasting tried to take on Sky in the 1990s but ended in costly failure.

The Football League said yesterday it expected Granada and Carlton to honour the obligations of their three-year, £315million contract.

A spokesman said: 'Renegotiation is not something we would want to happen but if they come to us we will talk to them.'