2000: Having spent the 90s trialling various interactive and video-on-demand technologies, BT kicks off the new decade by instigating a more public pilot scheme. The service, launched in partnership with Yes Television, gives 400 homes in Hammersmith and Chiswick access to broadband internet plus on-demand content, including films, music videos and children's programming.
2002: The BT chairman, Sir Christopher Bland (pictured), announces that BT will enter the broadcast market as an integrated media company. After shareholder disquiet, this is watered down. Bland says he cannot envisage BT ever becoming a vertically integrated media company.
September 2004: BT begins testing a new set-top box, produced in agreement with the Freeview platform, which will allow digital terrestrial television households to receive additional on-demand and interactive services. But it reiterates its determination to steer clear of the content side of the business.
November 2004: As part of a company-wide restructure, BT creates a new division called BT Entertainment. Headed by Andrew Burke, the unit is charged with pulling together the expertise the company will need to make its television- and video-over-the-internet services a greater commercial proposition. It also commits £3 billion a year to upgrading its network to deliver high-quality video streaming to the entire country.
2005: BT appoints Freeview's general manager, Lib Charlesworth, as the head of sales and marketing for its new TV services business. Dan Marks (pictured), the chief executive of BT Television Services, also hires Sky's head of pay-per-view, Karen Saunders, to oversee programming.
Fast forward ...
2007: As Bland prepares to retire, he unveils a radical proposal that will indeed make BT an integrated television producer and distributor - its broadband businesses are to be hived off into a separate company, which will then be merged with BSkyB. The Government orders a Monopolies Commission inquiry.
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