The BBC and commercial television network ITV are in talks to save ITV's troubled digital TV business and allow free digital access to BBC channels, Britain's Financial Timesnewspaper has reported.
Sources close to the talks told the newspaper the rescue plan for ITV Digital involves Britain's free-to-air broadcasters forming a "digital coalition" to pool broadcast and transmission operations and develop a set-top box to deliver free multi-channel digital television.
The report said the British Broadcasting Corporation feared that if the struggling ITV Digital pay-TV service is shut down, the only digital TV distribution system in the UK will be Mr Rupert Murdoch's British Sky Broadcasting, and cable networks Telewest and NTL - both under the sway of US investors, the paper reported.
However a BBC spokeswoman said she was not immediately aware of any such talks with ITV to rescue its digital television business.
She said the BBC was committed to affordable digital set-top boxes and free-to-air digital services as part of Britain's plan for a full switch to digital services between 2006 and 2010.
Under the digital coalition scheme involving the BBC, ITV, Channel Four and potentially Channel 5, ITV could break even after further investment of less than 150 million pounds, the newspaper said.
The BBC would not commit any money, the FT reported.
The parent companies of ITV Digital - British television groups Granada and Carlton Communications - say the digital television business needs a cash injection of at least 300 million pounds to break even, the FT said.
The coalition initiative is weeks away from completion and several parties could yet object, the newspaper said.
PA