10 Facts About BBC Prime

BBC Prime was the BBC's general entertainment TV channel in Europe, Middle East, Africa, South Asia and Asia Pacific from 30 January 1995 until 11 November 2009, when it was replaced by BBC Entertainment.

BBC Prime was launched at 19:00 GMT on Thursday, 26 January 1995 when the former BBC World Service Television was split into two separate television stations:.

Every day since the channel's 2000 rebrand, it allocated six hours per day to educational programmes from BBC Learning ; this practice was abandoned on 23 July 2006 "with the intention of improving the relevance and appeal of the channel to the widest audience".

When it first launched, BBC Prime carried programming from the former ITV company Thames Television, since BBC Worldwide had a joint venture with Thames's parent company, Pearson and Cox Communications, known as European Channel Management.

Unlike the BBC's domestic channels, and some of their foreign channels paid for by the UK Foreign Office, BBC Prime was funded by subscription available either as part of a satellite package or as a stand-alone channel.

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Much of BBC Prime's programming was available to watch through BBC One, Two or the UKTV network, part owned by the BBC and showing archive programming.

On 4 December 2000, BBC Prime rebranded for the second time, created by Lambie-Nairn.

Similar channel, called BBC Prime Japan, launched in Japan on 1 December 2004, but ceased broadcasting on 30 April 2006 owing to problems with its local distributor.

In September 2006 it was announced that the BBC Prime brand was to be phased out and replaced by BBC Entertainment, one of a number of new international channels planned by BBC Worldwide.

BBC Prime was completely replaced by BBC Entertainment on 11 November 2009.