ITV TO FORM NEW ONLINE DIVISION

ITV ARE to form a new division, ITV Interactive, as the unified home for all online and interactive activities and the portal operations of ITV Active.
ITV Interactive will incorporate Carlton’s and Granada’s existing programme related online sites such as ‘Coronation Street’, ‘Cold Feet’ and ‘Crossroads’ and ITV sites including ‘Who Wants to be a Millionaire’, ‘ITV Football’ and ‘ITV Weather’. Taken together, these sites already generate some 25 million page impressions per month.
The first stage of ITV Interactive’s operations, the launch of ITV.com, is targeted to coincide with the launch of the ITV Autumn schedule.
ITV.com will bring together all the ITV programme brands under one online umbrella delivering an enhanced range of information, entertainment and interactive services to ITV viewers. With extensive cross promotion planned from ITV’s channels, offering exposure to some 50 million viewers each week, ITV.com will become one of the top ten entertainment sites in the UK.
ITV Interactive will be headed by Paul Greensmith who has been appointed ITV Director of Interactivity. Greensmith, currently Chief Operating Officer of Carlton Interactive, will assume responsibility for all of ITV’s Interactive operations reporting to Stuart Prebble, Chief Executive of ITV. (CD)