Jodi O'Donnell: Heather Du Plessis-Allan talks with Jodi O’Donnell on TVNZ’s $10.7m profit.

There are questions over whether TVNZ cut too many jobs as it turns a surprisingly strong profit. 

The broadcaster's reported an after-tax profit of nearly $26million dollars - after an $85million dollar loss last year. 

But it comes after the broadcaster cut jobs - including canning production of programmes like Fair Go, Sunday and the midday and night-time news bulletins. 

Talking to Heather Du-Plessis Allan, CEO Jodi O'Donnell denied that the cuts were excessive. 

She says the company had to make decisions to ensure the business remained sustainable into the future. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
TV and Z has announced a surprise dividend to be
paid to the government of three million dollars. The broadcaster
has delivered a twenty five million dollar after tax profit,
which is a huge turnaround after last year's eighty five
million dollar loss. Jody O'Donnell is the CEO of TV
and Z. Hey, Jody, Hi, here the hell are you?

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Well?

Speaker 1 (00:16):
Thank you? How wrong was I?

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Though?

Speaker 1 (00:18):
Just a couple of days ago, I was saying, that's
the end of the dividends from TV and Z and
here you go. How'd you do it? Well?

Speaker 2 (00:23):
Look, I think that like many businesses last year, we
all had to make really hard decisions. But wasn't just
around us actually resetting our cost base. We actually really
ruthlessly focused around revenue initiatives as well, so we were
able to do it at the same time, and our
revenue was stronger than we had predicted.

Speaker 1 (00:42):
Do you think it's the last one though, for the
last dividend? Yeah, for a while.

Speaker 2 (00:45):
Look, it's our obligation to pay a dividend. We've actually
paid eight dividends over the last ten years, so it's
a process that we go through every year.

Speaker 1 (00:54):
And if you're going to have a couple of losses
at least straight you're not going to be paying a dividend,
are you.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
Well, Again, it's a process that would have to go
through every day, So I'm not going to stay up
front whether it's in or it's out.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
Yeah, would you pay one in the loss?

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Again, it would have to be a conversation that we
have with our board at the time.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
Okay, so it's a possibility, given that you did turn
around a profit here, did you cut too hard when
you cut?

Speaker 2 (01:16):
I knew you'd ask me that question. Look like I said,
we had to make the decisions that we had in
front of us at the time, and so what was
really important is that we set the cost base of
the business into a stable position that we could see
at least for the next three or four years. And
that was really important for us as we started our
investment program. So over the next two years, in particular,
we're self funding an investment program, and that's really important

(01:38):
for us to ensure that we can transform.

Speaker 1 (01:39):
Tving said.

Speaker 2 (01:40):
The first thing that all of our viewers will see
will be a brand new TVNZ plus platform next year
that obviously allows us to have enhanced user experiences, but
also allows us to unlock the pay capability, which you
would have heard us announced earlier this week with in
conjunction with a fef for World Cup rights.

Speaker 1 (01:57):
When is the FIFA World Cup again?

Speaker 2 (01:58):
It's middle June next year.

Speaker 1 (02:00):
Okay, So does that is that the start of you
guys charging us for things? I mean, it's obviously the
first case of it, but how soon after that does
that become the regular thing?

Speaker 2 (02:07):
Well, look, it's the first thing that we've identified that's
really important, and we know we'll be big for audiences.
So as a free to we broadcaster, there's always rights
that have been outside of our reach. So for us
to unlock that pay capability, we want to test and
learn how do the super fans want to watch all
one hundred and four matches and then how do we
balance that as well with the free to wear audience exposure.

(02:28):
So we've said the all whites will all be free
on TVNZ one, so it'll be a huge learning opportunity
for us.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
Do you think are you guys looking at just charging
punters for the big events or do you think you're
going to charge us for the regular stuff that we
like to watch, like Bluey.

Speaker 2 (02:44):
Fifty million streams of Bluey in the last wild how
many of them were your household?

Speaker 1 (02:49):
So keep telling you put Bluey behind the pay will
you make a mint?

Speaker 2 (02:52):
Look, we are thinking about it in an event space
at the moment. So what we want to be able
to do is you know, tvn Z is free at
its core, and that will continue. We're an ad funded
business and we will be free. But certainly once we
test this event pass with FIFA World Cup, we'll look
for other opportunities as well. It's really around what the
audience audiences want, but also with that pay capability, it

(03:13):
means we can compete for rights that we haven't been able.

Speaker 1 (03:15):
To do in that I spoke to you about the netball, Yeah,
really happy.

Speaker 2 (03:19):
You're just really happy to make it accessible for all
New Zealanders And I think.

Speaker 1 (03:22):
I mean, are you actually paying anything or are you
just the lucky recipient of the netball.

Speaker 2 (03:27):
That's obviously our commercial sensitivity, so I won't be able
to answer that, but certainly we've had the netball for
the last two years. We've had a free game a week,
and so we can see the audience growth there and
how much the audiences love it, and it's really important
for us that we can obviously showcase that well.

Speaker 1 (03:42):
That it's got to be a point at which when
as you get more we're coming to watch the FEFA,
then we're coming to watch the netball, then we're coming
to watch the MPC, and we're watching all this stuff.
At some point you will have a critical mass where
you can start checking a lot more stuff behind the
pay well right, because we'll get used to the platform.

Speaker 2 (03:56):
Yeah. Again, we are at our heart free to wear
and so that's a really important part of our DNA.
But with this capability it means that we can compete.
You need to make money, Joy, We do need to
make money, No, absolutely, we do, and we will always
make the decisions based on that basis.

Speaker 1 (04:11):
Speaking of which, how much is are in Z paying
you to be in the building.

Speaker 2 (04:14):
Again, that's a commercial negotiation, but we're looking forward to
them when they do move on.

Speaker 1 (04:21):
Thank you, Jody, It's worth try Jody o'donald TV and
z's CEO. For more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive, Listen
live to News Talk z'd B from four pm weekdays,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.