BBC-British Broadcasting Corporation

The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current state with its current name on New Year's Day 1927. The oldest and largest local and global broadcaster by stature and by number of employees, the BBC employs over 21,000 staff in total, of whom approximately 17,900 are in public-sector broadcasting.

The BBC do this across:

• A portfolio of television services, including the UK’s most-watched channel BBC One and our multi award-winning channels for children, as well as national and regional television programmes and services across England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.

• Ten UK-wide radio networks, providing the best live music broadcasting in the UK, as well as speech radio which informs, educates and entertains. We also have two national radio services each in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and local radio stations across England and the Channel Islands, providing an invaluable and unique service to listeners across the UK.

• The BBC digital services including BBC News, Sport, Weather CBBC and CBeebies, iPlayer and BBC Sounds, BBC Red Button and our vast archive

• BBC World Service television, radio and online on more than 40 languages.

The BBC was established under a royal charter, and operates under an agreement with the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. Its work is funded principally by an annual television licence fee[10] which is charged to all British households, companies, and organisations using any type of equipment to receive or record live television broadcasts or to use the BBC's streaming service, iPlayer. The fee is set by the British Government, agreed by Parliament, and is used to fund the BBC's radio, TV, and online services covering the nations and regions of the UK. Since 1 April 2014, it has also funded the BBC World Service (launched in 1932 as the BBC Empire Service), which broadcasts in 28 languages and provides comprehensive TV, radio, and online services in Arabic and Persian.

Some of the BBC's revenue comes from its commercial subsidiary BBC Studios (formerly BBC Worldwide), which sells BBC programmes and services internationally and also distributes the BBC's international 24-hour English-language news services BBC News, and from BBC.com, provided by BBC Global News Ltd.In 2009, the company was awarded the Queen's Award for Enterprise in recognition of its international achievements in business.

Since its formation in 1922, the BBC has played a prominent role in British life and culture. It is sometimes informally referred to as the Beeb or Auntie.