The company has reported a net profit of $1.05m on that revenue.

Generating close to half of total revenue were the television productions and copyright segment, where revenue was down $1.44m to $21.11m. Australian productions commissioned during the six months included season 11 of Selling Houses Australia and series two of Love It Or List It. Both shows are amongst the most-watched programs on Foxtel via the Lifestyle channel. Long-running US series in production in the half included series 11 and 12 of Deadly Women for Investigation Discovery.

Neale Whitaker & Andrew Winter in Love It Or List It

The 7Beyond JV, which returned a profit of $87,000 each for Seven and Beyond, had My Dream Lottery Homes commissioned for a fourth and fifth season.

Home Entertainment revenue leapt 73% to $7.35m after significant stock returns for the period 12 months prior.

The distribution division reported revenue was up $691,000 to $11.19m. Beyond reported strong sales for Mythbusters and Deadly Women.

Digital Marketing revenue was down 4.3% to $5.31m. The division’s Beyond D is working with Google to provide Australian businesses with their own Google assistants.

It is alleged Brody Clarke, 35, transferred $7.3 million from Birteku and $2.5 million from WIN to his personal bank account while he was employed as a junior lawyer in corporate law firm Atanaskovic Hartnell Lawyers, in order to dishonestly obtain a financial advantage.

In two multimillion-dollar transfers from Birketu to Clarke, it is alleged Clarke instructed Deutsche Bank to make the transfers.

The transfers were allegedly made on eight occasions between June 2016 and August 2017.

Clarke was granted bail at Central Local Court on Wednesday and his barrister, George Thomas, told the court Clarke turned himself in to the authorities in early October.

The criminal matter will return to court on March 14.

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That silver medal status changed after the abrupt departure of Anthony “The Cat” Catalano from the Fairfax-backed property listings business Domain.

On February 7, BlackRock sold more than 55 million of its 144 million shares in Fairfax. That reduced BlackRock’s stake from 6.3% to about 4%, well below the ASX’s 5% substantial shareholder threshold.

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Highlights:

• Total external revenue up 2% to £3,132 million (2016: £3,064 million), driven by double digit growth in non-net advertiser revenues (NAR).

• Total ITV Studios revenue up 13% to £1,582 million (2016: £1,395 million), with 7% organic revenue growth, excluding currency.

• Online, Pay & Interactive up 7% to £248 million (2016: £231 million), with double digit growth in Online.

Carolyn McCall, ITV chief executive, said:

“There is no doubt that ITV’s operational performance in 2017 in a challenging environment was strong. ITV delivered a great viewing performance on-screen and online and double-digit revenue growth in video on demand advertising and ITV Studios. This gives us a solid foundation to build on for the next phase of ITV’s development.

Hosts of ITV Studios Australia’s Celebrity Julia Morris and Chris Brown

“We are very focused on our strategic refresh. This will enable us to define a clear strategy and priorities that will highlight the opportunities and address the challenges that we face in an increasingly competitive media landscape. This project is well underway.

“We have had a great start to 2018. On-screen we have grown our viewing share and volume, and online we have continued to deliver double digit growth in viewing. We expect ITV Family NAR to be positive in the first half, with Q1 up 1% and growth in Q2 around the football.

“ITV Studios is seeing increasing demand for its formats and dramas, particularly in the UK and US, and we have over 60% of this year’s expected revenue already booked.”

Ross Dagan

Dagan will be responsible for Network Ten’s news content and operations across all distribution platforms, including TEN Eyewitness News First At Five and news content on ten daily, the new website that will launch this year.

He will report to Network Ten chief content officer Beverley McGarvey.

An experienced media industry executive with a strong record of leadership, achievement and innovation across Australia, New Zealand, Asia and the Middle East, Queensland-born Dagan is currently executive producer for news at Aljazeera English, based in Doha, Qatar.

Dagan’s previous roles have included director of news Brisbane and Seven Queensland at Seven Network, head of news and current affairs at TVNZ and director of news Sydney and Brisbane at Network Ten.

Beverley McGarvey said: “The appointment of Ross is the next step in the evolution of our News service and I am very pleased that someone with his Australian and global experience has agreed to join Network Ten.

“Network Ten has a very proud heritage in News, while CBS is one of the leading news organisations in the world. That combination underpins our commitment to building our News service.

“With more than 20 years’ experience in news, Ross has unique credentials, a proven track record and a reputation for leading change.

“He is the ideal person to lead and expand our News division,” she said.

Dagan said: “Network Ten’s people are its greatest assets, many of whom I have had the privilege of working alongside before.

“I am looking forward to returning home to help them build on the strengths of Ten News across all platforms.

“The network is extraordinarily well-placed to look to the future of news and how we produce and deliver news, information and conversations that are most importantly credible, but also contemporary and engaging,” he said.

Every Cloud Productions’s Deb Cox and Fiona Eagger

Martino’s appointment comes as Every Cloud plans to progress a diverse slate of projects in development to move through into production.

Martino has worked on series Good Guys Bad Guys, Halifax, Stingers, Something in the Air, Crash Burn and the showcase series, Satisfaction.

Creator, script producer and writer of Carla Cametti PD, Martino script-produced and produced series five of Nine’s House Husbands, wrote episodes of Ten’s high-rating and critically acclaimed Brothers In Arms and Every Cloud Productions’ hit series Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries for the ABC.

The appointment of Martino comes as Every Cloud Productions is celebrating females of the industry through its Women in Front campaign. The campaign highlights Every Cloud’s advocacy and credentials for championing screen equity of females within the television industry. Throughout Every Cloud’s history of productions, it has championed female storytelling and has been a strong advocate of female representation in front and behind the camera.

Co-founder and creative director Deb Cox said, “Jo’s appointment reaffirms Every Cloud’s commitment to embedding writers within the company. I look forward to working with Jo and other creatives in what is shaping up to be one of our most exciting years of content development.”

CEO and co-founder Fiona Eagger added: “As a writer-led production company we are thrilled to appoint another talented female writer to the company who will work alongside creative director Deb Cox. Jo brings vast experience in scripted content, which will support Every Cloud Productions’ objective of making and delivering the highest-quality scripted productions to audiences in Australia and internationally. We are particularly pleased to announce Jo’s appointment during our Women in Front campaign.”

The 22-year-old has landed the dream internship: a gig travelling around the world for free, documenting his adventures for Discovery Channel’s social media platforms and Heaps of Stuff blog.

Hailing from Auckland, Anderson works as a gib stopper by day and freelances as a photographer/videographer. As passionate as he is about exploring the world, he is equally fuelled by the adventures that New Zealand has to offer and uses every opportunity to plan weekend road trips around the country to show his Kiwi followers the beauty and experiences they can find without having to travel too far.

Anderson’s internship will see him creating content in Japan, the USA, Germany, South Africa and Croatia, and he’ll also visit some of Discovery’s overseas headquarters during his journey. Plus he gets to take a lucky mate along for the ride.

Kaleb Anderson

The final five with Kaleb in the Discovery Intern competition were Andrew Cooney (22) from the Central Coast, NSW; Jeffrey Kieffer (20) from the Tweed Coast, NSW; Kate Carragher (34) from the Central Coast, NSW and Sophie Piearcey (26) from Queenstown, New Zealand.

Discovery will be offering each of the talented photographers and content makers the opportunity to contribute to Heaps of Stuff.

Now in its second year, the Discovery Intern competition searches for the best bloggers from Australia and New Zealand who are creative, love to travel and are armed with the skills to tell the story of a place through images, words and videos. After the Top 50 were announced, it was up to the public to determine the Top 5 through voting. Anderson’s submissions stood out from the start and he quickly emerged as a fan favourite.

Don’t miss Mediaweek New Zealand tomorrow with John Drinnan.

“There’s a blockbuster lineup of rugby league programming too – a new-look NRL Footy Show, a new-look Sports Sunday and a new-look Sunday Footy Show will be joined by the brand new 100% Footy program, the Intrust Super Premiership in NSW, and the Intrust Super Cup in Queensland.

“In addition to 9Now providing access to live-streamed rugby league matches and programs, the Wide World of Sports digital offering on wwos.com.au will keep rugby league fans up to speed online with enhanced clips and highlights of all matches, live scores and statistics, round-the-clock news and expert analysis.”

Nine’s head of rugby league Simon Fordham said: “This year we are all about creating the best seat in the house at the biggest games live and free for footy fans. Nine has been the home of rugby league for four decades, but this year’s offering across Nine, 9Now and wwos.com.au is unprecedented. Our rugby league content is delivered by the biggest names in the game and that’s what sets us apart as a destination for all footy fans.”

The Wide World of Sports commentary team is again led by Ray “Rabs” Warren, the only voice rugby league fans have known and loved for over 40 years.

James Bracey will host Thursday Night Football, Friday Night Football, Saturday Night Football and Sunday Afternoon Football, and he will be joined by rugby league immortals Andrew Johns and Wally Lewis, along with Phil Gould, Peter Sterling, Paul Vautin, Darren Lockyer, Brad Fittler, Ray Hadley and Mat Thompson.

The growth of women’s rugby league is a huge focus on Nine in 2018. Nine and 9Now will broadcast up to eight women’s matches live and free in HD across the season, including a stand-alone women’s State of Origin game on Friday June 22 from North Sydney Oval. Jillaroos Ruan Sims and Allana Ferguson will join the Nine team across the footy programs, as well as in commentary for the women’s games and the Intrust Super Premiership in NSW.

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Meanwhile, as if hosting a weekly television show, radio show and having a baby weren’t enough, Erin Molan has accepted another job, reports News Corp’s Karlie Rutherford.

As well as hosting the revamped NRL Footy Show on Channel 9, Molan will also host the new-look Sunday Footy Show, both starting next week.

It’s a first for anyone at the network.

Erin Molan

Molan does this while juggling constant morning sickness, despite being halfway through her first pregnancy.

“Look, it will be hard and, don’t get me wrong, I’m nervous about not just the shows themselves but how I will balance it all when the bub comes and all the stuff associated with it, but it’s the same as any woman expecting her first child, regardless of what industry she’s in,” Molan said before Nine’s official NRL season launch yesterday.”

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