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Rupert Murdoch Sky

BSkyB votes to scrap ‘British’ prefix from corporate branding

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By John Glenday, Reporter

November 21, 2014 | 1 min read

BSkyB is to hold a vote at its annual meeting later today on whether to drop the ‘British’ prefix from its title and refer to itself simply as Sky.

The move follows a series of continental acquisitions which have seen the British based subscription TV provider expand to become a European one, a scale the company is now keen to reflect in its branding.

Rupert Murdoch’s 21st century Fox, which owns a 39.1 per cent stake in BSkyB, is targeting the continent for future growth after the broadcaster bought out its sister companies in Germany and Italy for £6.88bn.

The UK market, where Sky has signed just under half of all households generating £1bn in annual profits, is seen as maxed out.

The name change will see BSkyB come full circle from its formation in the late 1980s when it was originally known as Sky and will allow it to combine programming budgets and revenues to see off threats from online streaming services such as Netflix and rival subscription providers such as Virgin Media and BT.

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