
RT | A YEAR IN REVIEW | 2019
MODEST INCREASE IN TOTAL REVENUE TOGETHER WITH REDUCED OPERATING COSTS SEES RT RETURN EBIDTA OF 8.4 MILLION, BEFORE SPECIAL EVENTS COSTS, AND AN OVERALL NET DEFICIT OF 7.2M IN 2019
See http://www.rte.ie/annualreport for full the report.
RT is today releasing its Annual Report and Group Consolidated Financial Statements for the Year Ended 31st December 2019 (RT submitted its Annual Report and Group Consolidated Financial Statements for the Year Ended 31st December 2019 to Government in July 2020.)
RT Annual Report 2019, in summary:
Operating costs, including the costs of special events, of 337.8 million, were reduced by 2 million compared to 2018.
Modest increase in total revenue of 342.1m (2018 339.1m).
Decline in commercial revenue by 4.2 million to 145.8 million due to Brexit uncertainty and changes in media consumption habits.
Licence fee income increased by a net 7.2 million to 196.3 million due to the 8.9 million increase in public funding in Budget 2019 from the DEASP in respect of free' television licences, a part reversal of the public funding cuts made since 2010.
Special events, including the Rugby World Cup and local and European elections, amounted to 4.1 million and were lower than 2018 levels, resulting in a lower Net Deficit before Exceptional Items and Tax for the year of 9.1 million (2018 12.6 million).
Net Deficit after tax and Exceptional Items for the year of 7.2 million (2018 13 million).
The Annual Report also highlights RT 's many achievements in 2019, including:
RT Player saw a growth of 20% in viewing in 2019.
RT television had 42 of the top 50 most-watched programmes of 2019, up from 39 in 2018.
RT Supporting the Arts partnered with more than 140 local, national and community arts events, up from 130 in 2018.
The RT News studio is the busiest television studio in Ireland, broadcasting more than 1,700 news bulletins and programmes each year. It was completely refurbished in 2019.
Demand for audience seats for The Late Late Toy Show 2019 surpassed previous years, withmore than 90,000 applications; 1.7million people watched the show on RT platforms.
The RT Guide bumper Christmas issue continued to be an Irish publishing phenomenon, with almost 270,000 copies sold.
Almost 2 million radio listeners tuned in to RT each week; 51.9% of the adult (15 ) population listened every week in 2019.
In 2019 there were 75 million podcast and clip streams from RT 's on-demand audio catalogue.
In addition:
157 children joined the first RT Youth Assembly on Climate
The 2FM Xmas Ball raised over 3million for the ISPCC since 2015
Almost 1million people tuned in to each of the Dublin v Kerry All-Ireland Football Final and Replay
RT lyric fm celebrated 20 years on air
Ireland bid farewell to broadcasting legend, Gay Byrne.
Dee Forbes, Director-General RT , said: Across the organisation, we worked hard in 2019 to create real value for our audiences by producing more original content on RT Player, diversifying into podcasts and streaming and repurposing our journalism for all platforms to reach people, wherever they are and whenever they like. We also continued to deliver on our commitment to captivating Irish audiences across our news and current affairs, sport, factual and entertainment content, while producing special shared moments, including the GAA Championship and another outstanding The Late Late Toy Showand engaging our younger audiences on a topic of worldwide concern, through the innovative RT on Climate Youth Assembly.
Dee Forbes concluded: While there was a lot to be proud of in 2019, it was a year that ended with sadness as we lost our dear friend and colleague, Gay Byrne.
Moya Doherty, Chair of the RT Board, commented: I said in 2018, that in 2019 we would experience another tough year for the media sector, and that proved to be true. While public-service providers, including RT , made great efforts to continue to adapt and change to retain and remain relevant to audiences, the reality is that we continue to fight for our survival as the need for trusted, independent, quality journalism and programming has never been more important to our societies and democracies. In 2019 we came face to face with how a lack of funding reform and legislative planning is threatening a public-service platform that is central to our sense of selves, our communities, our cultures and our global voice.
Despite some truly great achievements highlighted in our Annual Report, RT cannot run deficits indefinitely. The current funding model is broken, and RT will face a material uncertainty about its capacity to provide the same level of services in the medium term if it is not resolved quickly and definitively. That is why the Future Media Commission is so important and RT is fully engaged with the process.
See http://www.rte.ie/annualreport for more and to download the full report.
Most recent headlines
09/11/2025
Dalet today announced a transformative leap forward for media operations: Agentic Artificial Intelligence (AI) that unifies the Dalet ecosystem under one natura...
18/10/2025
New England Sports Network (NESN) has chosen Harmonic, working with Astound Business Solutions, as its enterprise technology partner to transform primary distri...
18/10/2025
NEW ORLEANS, La. In the run-up to the start of the NBA season, WVUE-TV and Gray Local Media have announced a deal with DirecTV that will greatly expand access t...
18/10/2025
Berklee Celebrates 40 Years of the Fall Together Concert Faculty composers Bob Pilkington and Greg Hopkins are among the featured artists for this year's ...
17/10/2025
NEP Group Receives New Equity Investment From 26North Partners LP, Co-InvestorsCarlyle remains the largest shareholder as the company prepares for the futureBy ...
17/10/2025
Apple Lands Five-Year Deal for F1 Distribution in the U.S.Besides airing on Apple TV, the sport will be amplified on other Apple servicesBy Ken Kerschbaumer, Ed...
17/10/2025
SVG Sit-Down: Marshall Electronics' Bernie Keach on the Future of PTZ Camera...
17/10/2025
L2 Productions' REMI Facility in Austin Can Produce Content From AnywhereMusic festivals, sports events are produced via flypacks and remote control roomsBy...
17/10/2025
By Lucy Spicer
One of the most exciting things about the Sundance Film Festival...
17/10/2025
(L-R) Christopher Meyer, Addison Timlin, Cooper Raiff, Lili Reinhart, Alyah Chan...
17/10/2025
M sica e arte se uniram em uma noite especial na semana passada na ZIV Gallery, ...
17/10/2025
Music and art came together for one special night last week at ZIV Gallery, an i...
17/10/2025
Spotify and FC Barcelona are extending our partnership through 2030, continuing a collaboration that's redefining how fans, players, and artists connect. Th...
17/10/2025
MURRIETA, Calif. The Sports Fishing Championship (SFC) has deployed DigitalGlue's creative.space storage platform to streamline video production by centrali...
17/10/2025
BELLEVUE, Wash. Football continued to cement its reputation as a bulwark of TV advertising in Q3 2025 with new data from iSpot that showed both the NFL and coll...
17/10/2025
The Sports Fishing Championship (SFC), the premier competitive saltwater fishing series, has transformed its production workflow by adopting creative.space, the...
17/10/2025
QuickLink, a leading provider of award-winning multi-camera video productions and remote contribution solutions, announces the release of StudioPro Version 4, ...
17/10/2025
Although the annual Grammy Awards celebration is best known for recognizing achievements in the recording industry, the show often proves a visual spectacle as ...
17/10/2025
OpenDrives, Inc., a leading provider of software-defined data storage and data services, has promoted Alex Dunfey to Chief Technology Officer (CTO) from his for...
17/10/2025
The University of Arizona (UofA) has significantly upgraded its broadcast communication infrastructure with the integration of Riedel Communications' advanc...
17/10/2025
Harmonic (NASDAQ: HLIT) today announced that New England Sports Network (NESN), owned by Fenway Sports Group and Delaware North, has selected Harmonic as its en...
17/10/2025
Austin PBS has recently upgraded its facility-wide communications infrastructure, deploying Clear-Com 's Eclipse HX, FreeSpeak II beltpacks, and V-Series ...
17/10/2025
ZEISS announces an open call for the closed BETA testing phase of CinCraft Virtual Lens Technology, the innovative digital tool that brings authentic lens chara...
17/10/2025
Situated in the town of Kokkola, Centria University of Applied Sciences offers higher education across five core fields: engineering, business, social and healt...
17/10/2025
Public information channel in Georgia, USA, to implement a powerful, simple, and cost-effective playout automation platform.
Pebble, the leading automation, co...
17/10/2025
HBO Max is reporting that it has launched in 15 new markets, including Bangladesh, Cambodia, Macau, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Ukraine, boosting the streaming serv...
17/10/2025
Netflix said it will make a major push into video podcasts, inking a wide-ranging deal with Spotify through which it will offer 16 podcasts in the U.S. starting...
17/10/2025
Lexington, Ky. As part of a push to highlight its advanced advertising capabilities, Viamedia has launched a new AI-powered ad tech platform and officially rebr...
17/10/2025
NEW YORK QuickLink has announced the release of StudioPro Version 4, which the company is calling the most significant upgrade yet to its flagship video product...
17/10/2025
NEW YORK and CUPERTINO, Calif. Apple and NBCUniversal said they will sell Apple TV and Peacock streaming bundles to U.S. subscribers starting Oct. 20....
17/10/2025
Q&A with Boston Conservatory Choral Conductor Stephen Spinelli How his research into the lost manuscripts of composer Florence Price led to a Grammy-winning c...
17/10/2025
Back to All News
Netflix ISP Speed Index for September 2025
Product
17 October 2025
Global
Link copied to clipboard
This month, 1% of Internet Service Pro...
17/10/2025
NVIDIA's on the ground at Open Source AI Week. Stay tuned for a celebration ...
17/10/2025
AI has ignited a new industrial revolution.
NVIDIA and TSMC are working togethe...
17/10/2025
Gexcon is a trusted safety and risk management partner for complex, high hazard environments. ICG has been a dedicated marketing partner to Gexcon since 2018, b...
17/10/2025
Here is your host, Patrick Kielty!
After an incredible breakthrough year, Kingf...
16/10/2025
SVG Sit-Down: FUJIFILM Execs on GFX ETERNA 55 Camera, Importance of Shallow-Dept...
16/10/2025
Squash's Most Ambitious Broadcast Production To Be Deployed at Comcast Busin...
16/10/2025
Main Street Sports Group Inks Deal With Omaha Productions, Launches Original-Con...
16/10/2025
A Historic Precursor? FIFA, HBS, DAZN Offer an Inside Look at Production of FIFA...
16/10/2025
Prime Video Offers Sneak Peak at New NBA on Prime StudioThe massive 13,000-sq-ft, two-story studio features a LED regulation half court and hoopBy Jason Dachman...
16/10/2025
SVG Remote Production Forum Draws Record Crowd for Visit to PGA TOUR Studios, De...
16/10/2025
BitFire's Ben Grafchik on How Growing Cloud Workflows Are Impacting the Live...
16/10/2025
AI technology is advancing quickly, bringing both new creative possibilities and...
16/10/2025
In 2017, Imani Ellis launched CultureCon, a conference that's become a must-attend event for more than 10,000 diverse creatives and Black professionals to c...
16/10/2025
It might still be a little early to break out the tinsel and mistletoe, but Spotify's already queuing up some holiday magic. This year's Spotify Singles...
16/10/2025
Earlier this year, our in-house publishing imprint, Spotify Audiobooks, put out ...
16/10/2025
VAMPIRE has been integrated onto GM Defenses Infantry Squad Vehicle (ISV), providing a mobile solution to effectively and affordably counter small drone threat...
16/10/2025
The AgilePod mounted on the host aircraft....
16/10/2025
60% say infotainment systems are a critical purchasing or leasing consideration,...