HIT Entertainment will announce today that it has teamed up with John Malone’s Liberty Global to show Thomas the Tank Engine around Europe through a new television channel called JimJam.

The tie-up, requiring €25 million (£18 million) of investment from both sides, sees Liberty Global buy JimJam, only broadcast in Italy at present, and give a share to HIT in return for access to Thomas, Bob the Builder, and HIT’s other characters. HIT, owned by Apax Partners, is aiming to mirror the arrangement it has in the United States, where it is a shareholder in the US children’s network Sprout.

Shane O’Neill, from Liberty Global’s content arm, Chellomedia, said: “We saw that Sprout has been extremely successful for its partner, Comcast, generating real resonance in the family segment.”

Liberty Global will immediately put the channel on its cable networks in Eastern Europe and the Benelux countries, as well as Italy, taking its reach across the continent to 6.5 million subscribers. The plan is to advance to ten million by the year end.

The parties hope to deploy JimJam around the world, although the UK and the US are excluded. “The UK market is well provided for – it has a lot of wonderful channels,” said Bruce Steinberg, the chief executive of HIT.

HIT characters are well known in the UK, and transmitted in Germany, France and Spain on various local channels. However, constant exposure to preschool children is crucial to maintaining the merchandise sales that are the main profit generators.

–– Rupert Howell, who once ran HHCL, the advertising agency behind the “You’ve been Tangoed” campaign, has been named as the head of ITV’s sales and marketing operations. The appointment completes the restructuring of the top team by Michael Grade, the executive chairman, and positions Mr Howell as a favourite to become chief executive in the future.

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