BBC puts Doctor Who franchise out to competitive tender
The BBC is seeking external platforms for its flagship sci-fi series after showrunner Russell T Davies departed and the 2026 Christmas special was scrapped.
The BBC is putting the Doctor Who franchise out to competitive tender, opening the door for the 60-year-old series to move away from the corporation's internal broadcasting ecosystem. Director-general Matt Brittin confirmed the shift in strategy ahead of the BBC's 2026 annual report.
The decision follows the departure in June of Russell T Davies, the screenwriter who revived the series in 2005. Davies framed the move as a step into an "unpredictable and new" era for the programme.
"There won't be a Christmas special - we only cooked that up to guarantee a future when no-one knew what would happen, but now we do know, there's no need for it," Davies said. "You'll have to wait a bit longer for new Doctor Who... but you'll be waiting for more Doctor Who than a one-off. So it's worth it."
As a direct result of the tender process, the BBC has axed the 2026 Christmas special for the second consecutive year. The episode had been slated for production by Cardiff-based independent company Bad Wolf.
A BBC spokesperson said the corporation, Davies and Bad Wolf "collectively decided not to go ahead" with the festive episode to "invest in the long-term future of the show." The spokesperson added that the goal is to ensure "when the Tardis lands once more, it does so in all its glory."
The tender process signals a notable shift in how the publicly funded broadcaster manages its long-running intellectual property. Rather than retaining production and broadcasting exclusively in-house or with established partners, the BBC is effectively asking rival platforms to bid for the rights to future series.
Brittin defended the strategy by pointing to the BBC's historical longevity. "I think that's one of the great things about the 100-year history of the BBC, we can do that, and we can creatively renew content and shows that people love, and we'll be working hard on that right now," he said.
The current live-action iteration is set to conclude in May 2025, with Ncuti Gatwa's Doctor regenerating into Billie Piper. While the flagship series faces this transitional pause, the corporation noted that a separate Doctor Who animation series for its CBeebies channel remains in production.
