Three Northern audio production companies are among 15 indies confirmed as the inaugural recipients of the BBC’s Radio Indie Development Fund.
Manchester-based Naked Productions, Newcastle-based Sister Sounds and Audio Always, based at MediaCity in Salford, have been selected to benefit from the funding following a competitive process involving 114 applications.
The £250,000 annual fund was launched in November by Charlotte Moore, BBC’s Chief Content Officer, and is set to boost the development capacity of the audio sector as well as create a pipeline of potential commissions from indies who may not already have commissions from the BBC.
The funding is designed to help recipients in a number of ways such as developing potential ideas for successful pitches, run internships and training schemes, hire people to boost development and production capabilities and establish new studio bases.
It forms part of BBC’s plans announced last year to move its creative and journalistic centre away from London, with BBC Radio committed to a number of changes including increasing the network radio and music spend outside of London to 50%.
The majority of the successful indies named as recipients of the fund are from outside of London, with a number of the audio production companies from Birmingham.
Tony Pilgrim, Head of Business and Change at BBC Radio & Music said: “We were inspired by the range and quality of the entries we received from the production community, so thank you to everyone who applied.
“The inaugural recipients with their ideas and projects will help us and the audio production community to champion new talent, increase diversity and be more representative of audiences. And this is just the start, so we look forward to working with more indies with brilliant ideas in the coming years as part of the development fund.”
