Broadcaster: Sky

ABOUT SKY

Sky plc, formerly known as British Sky Broadcasting or BskyB, is a European company that provides internet, phone and mainly television services. With headquarters in London, Sky operates in Ireland, Germany, Austria and Italy and is Europe's biggest leading media company and largest pay-TV broadcaster.

It was founded in November 1990 by the merger of Sky Television and British Satellite Broadcasting, and as of 2015 has 21 million customers. Despite this media conglomerate being seemingly independent, 21st Century Fox own 39% of Sky. 

To use their services and watch the 240+ channels they provide, you have to pay a monthly subscription fee which varies massively depending on the TV packs you choose to access. For example, my family pays £22 a month for the Family package which includes everything except Sky Movies and Sky Sports. 

The Movies package is an extra £18 a month which deters a lot of customers, so Sky will often offer incentives such as free Movies for six months if you introduce a friend, but this is why so many people use nothing but Netflix these days. 

However, Sky Movies does now offer a Buy and Keep service on Movies too, meaning you can pre-order the latest films for the same price you'd pay for a DVD and then when it's released in stores, it will be available on your Sky box and you'll be sent a copy without having to do anything. 

There are 11 movie channels in total, including a dedicated Disney one, which all feature different genres. Before Star Wars: The Force Awakens was released in cinemas, there was a dedicated Star Wars channel and occasionally a Harry Potter channel will pop up. 

One of the biggest advantages of Sky is having Sky's own channels; Sky Living, Sky Atlantic and Sky 1, which mostly feature shows from the US which are a huge success. For example, Atlantic is known as the "Home of HBO" which is an American TV channel featuring some of the biggest shows of our time like Game of Thrones. 

If Sky didn't have such big shows to offer their customers, Freeview would take over since there is no cost. It's the incentives, the extras and the range that keeps Sky customers hooked. 

Another thing people love about Sky is the boxsets service, meaning you can watch entire seasons of your favourite shows if you miss them live or forget to record them. This is extremely useful and again rivals Netflix. 

The planner is where your recorded shows go, with a deleted folder in case you hit the wrong button or a family member sneakily tries to get rid of your show from the system, and you can pause and rewind live TV so you don't have to stay glued to the screen at all times. 

WHAT TYPE OF ORGANISATION ARE THEY?

Sky are privately owned and are not controlled by a government. They are a profit-making company which means that they can choose what their profit is spent on and where it goes, plus they are commercially funded which means that they gain a profit from the advertisements they show. 

It's clear that Sky has a big profit from the fact that they manage to get shows like Game of Thrones, 24 and Modern Family on their own channels.

HOW IS SKY STRUCTURED, ORGANISED AND MANAGED? 

Sky employs over 30,000 employees and as previously mentioned, has 21 million subscribers as well as using horizontal and vertical integration.

Vertical integration means that the production company owns the companies that produce and distribute the shows and films, such as Sky Living and Sky Atlantic. 

Horizontal integration is where production companies can buy out other companies in order to distribute and exhibit their productions. This is how Sky broadcasts so many other channels such as ITV, BBC, E! and MTV.