Financial Financial revenue and profit Financial POSITIVE …s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/skygroup-sky-static/documents... · 2017-05-15 · 2. Our adjusted free cash flow is defined

01Sky plc

Financial | Financial revenue and profit | Composition of workforce

Financial revenue and profitThe past 12 months have been an outstanding period of growth for Sky.

We achieved strong performance, including revenue for the year which

was up 5% to £11.3 billion. In the UK and Ireland, revenue was up 6% and

Germany was our fastest growing market with revenue up 9%. Revenue

in Italy was slightly lower year-on-year at £2.2 billion.

Good control on costs, combined with our strong revenue growth, led

to an 18% increase in operating profit. Our effective tax rate was 21%.

We proposed a 3% increase in the dividend to 32.8 pence per share,

the eleventh consecutive year of growth.

Highlights

FinancialPOSITIVE CONTRIBUTION

Revenue grew by 5% this year, fuelled by strong operating momentum and growing customer demand.

Financial

£11.3bnGroup revenue for the year

1. Adjusted revenue and EBITDA are stated on a like-for-like basis assuming we have owned Sky Deutschland and Sky Italia from 1 July and they exclude exceptional items. The FX rate used is €1.31:£1.

2. Our adjusted free cash flow is defined as cash generated from operations after the impact of capital expenditure, net interest and tax paid, cash flows to and from joint ventures. Cash flow from Sky Deutschland and Sky Italia has been consolidated from 12 November 2014 onwards, using an FX rate of €1.34:£1.

For more information please see Sky’s Annual Report 2015.

Revenue and profit1

7,235

1,692

7,617

1,667

11,283

2,030

12,000

9,000

6,000

3,000

02013/142012/13 2014/15

£ m

illio

n

Adjusted revenue

EBITDA

BP – Data Sheet – Financial – Adjusted revenue

1,0061,028 1,0601,200

600

900

300

02013/142012/13 2014/15

£ m

illio

n

BP – Data Sheet – Financial – Adjusted free cash �ow

Adjusted free cash flow2

02Sky plc

Composition of workforceOur total workforce totals 29,270 employees across the UK, Ireland, Germany, Austria and Italy, and 27,443

of these are full-time equivalent (FTE) employees. As this is the first year of reporting as a group we are still

undertaking significant work to align people-related reporting across our territories. In particular, work is

being undertaken to align the categorisation of employees to ensure consistency of reporting.

The increase in redundancies this year has been primarily related to the closure of Sky Walkers in the UK

within the Retail directorate and the result of small scale exercises as part of our continued focus on

operational efficiency across the business. We always seek to redeploy people within Sky in the first instance.

Where this is not possible, we offer generous financial support as well as practical help.

Voluntary turnover has declined this year, following last year’s increase. This is in line with economic recovery

and industry movement.

UK and Ireland 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Total number of employees (full-time equivalent)2 (no.) 19,413 20,841 20,829

Number of compulsory redundancies (no.) 186 430 824

Staff turnover (voluntary) (%) 10.8 13.4 12.4

Staff on fixed-term or temporary contracts (no.) 480 481 422

Organic job growth (no.) 4,143 5,060 3,822

1. The total number of employees is calculated in ‘Heads’ which includes permanent, fixed-term contractors and ad hoc employees from continuing operations. Employees who work for the joint ventures, such as National Geographic and History Channel, are excluded from this figure.

2. The total number of employees has been calculated as Full-Time Equivalents (FTE) which includes permanent, fixed-term contractors and ad hoc employees from continuing operations. Employees who work for the joint ventures, such as National Geographic and History Channel, are excluded from this figure.

• UK and ROI: FTE is calculated quarterly and an average over the four quarters is taken at year end.

• Germany: FTE data is extracted from the SAP and Persis system.

• Italy: FTE data is extracted from the SAP system.

To see the scope and how we measure our performance please refer to our Basis of Reporting

documentation which can be found on our website sky.com/biggerpicture

Financial | Financial revenue and profit | Composition of workforce

Group employee numbers by territory1

UK and Ireland 22,013

Germany and Austria 4,367

Italy 2,890

Group employee numbers1

24,10925,356

29,29730,000

20,000

10,000

02012/132011/12 2014/15

Tota

l nu

mb

er o

f em

plo

yees

(no

.)1

BP – Data Sheet – Financial – Workforce composition

01Sky plc

Economic | Contribution to GDP | Tax contribution | Community contribution | Economic value distributed

Contribution to GDPAs a successful and growing business, Sky makes an important

economic contribution to the countries in which we operate. We act

as a powerhouse for the creative industries in Europe, supporting

128,000 jobs across our five territories and investing £4.9 billion in

quality news, sports and entertainment content.

We contribute £7.6 billion to GDP across the UK, Ireland, Germany,

Austria and Italy, and we generate £3.4 billion in tax revenues, of which

a total of £2.3 billion goes to the UK Exchequer, as Sky is one of the

largest taxpayers in the UK.

Total contribution to GDP1

2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Total contribution to GDP (£bn) 5.92 62, 3 7.64

1. Source: Oxford Economics. The Economic Impact of Sky in the UK, Ireland, Germany, Austria and Italy in 2014/15.

2. UK and Ireland only.

3. Source: Oxford Economics. The Economic Impact of Sky in the UK: 2014 update.

4. UK, Ireland, Germany, Austria and Italy. The figure from 2014/15 reflects the GDP contribution of the group across Europe.

EconomicPOSITIVE CONTRIBUTION

Highlights

We act as a powerhouse for the creative industries in Europe, supporting 128,000 jobs and investing £4.9 billion in quality content.

Economic

£7.6bncontribution to GDP

across our five territories

Tax contributionSky’s total tax contribution includes both taxes paid and taxes collected, providing a measure of Sky’s total

economic contribution in taxes.

The majority of our taxes are currently paid in the UK, where Sky is one of the largest taxpayers. The total

tax contribution for 2014/15 now includes the taxes paid and taxes collected for Sky Deutschland and Sky

Italia. Overall Sky’s tax contribution has increased as a result of these acquisitions, particularly in relation

to taxes collected.

The decrease in corporation tax is in part due to a lower tax rate in the UK in FY15. Sky Deutschland does not

pay corporation income tax because of its historic losses.

02Sky plc


Tax contribution continued

Total tax contribution1

Taxes borne: 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

On profits (e.g. corporation tax) 295 251 235

On transactions (e.g. duties and levies) 28 32 38

On labour (e.g. employer’s NIC) 91 119 147

Other taxes and levies 26 27 30

Total taxes borne 440 429 450

Taxes collected:

On transactions (e.g. net VAT) 563 546 927

On labour (e.g. PAYE, employees’ NIC) 248 312 357

Total taxes collected 810 857 1,284

Total tax contribution: 1,250 1,287 1,733

1. Corporation tax figures are on a cash basis and include continuing and discontinued operations as well as tax on exceptional items. All other tax figures are on an accruals basis.

Community contributionSky understands the importance of making a positive contribution to life in the UK and Ireland. We use the

London Benchmarking Group model to analyse our community contribution on an annual basis. This helps us

to assess whether the balance of our investments reflect our strategy as a business and helps us benchmark

ourselves amongst our peers. Our community contribution is assured by Corporate Citizenship and the

assurance statement can be viewed on our website.

In the UK and Ireland, our investment has increased by £11.4 million over the past year, reflecting the

commitments we have made in education and skills through the continued growth of Sky Academy, which

aims to support one million young people to unlock their potential by 2020. This growth results from the

launch of a new initiative, Sky Academy Careers Lab and the expansion of Sky Academy Skills Studios to

Livingston in Scotland.

Eighty-five percent of our community contribution is for community investment purposes. This reflects the

long-term partnerships we have with Youth Sport Trust, British Cycling and WWF, as well as expanding our own

initiative, Sky Academy. We recognise that the initiatives we undertake deliver both a social and a brand value

so we attribute almost 15% of the benefit to creating commercial value.

Over the coming year, we will be working with our colleagues in Germany and Italy to capture the value of the

investments they also make in the community.

Total community contributions2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Total community contributions (£m) 15.6 16.6 18.0

Community contributions as percentage of revenue (%)1 0.2 0.2 0.2

Allocation of community contributions 2014/15Cost allocation (%) Cost allocation (£)

Cash 80 14,501,773

Time 3 541,178

In-kind 2 321,686

Management 15 2,673,426

03Sky plc


Community contribution continued

Education and young people 58%

Health 20%

Social welfare 11%

Economic development 4%

Environment 3%

Arts/culture 2%

Other 2%

BP – Data Sheet – Economic – CommunityFocus of community contributions 2014/15

Community investment 85%

Commercial 13%

Charitable gift 2%

BP – Data Sheet – Economic – Community ContributionType of community contributions 2014/15

1. We have chosen to report externally on the basis of revenue rather than profit before tax. This is consistent with the other non-financial metrics we report on (i.e. carbon intensity) and enables us to benchmark ourselves in our industry.

Economic value distributedDistributed economic value is a measure of the monetary value a company adds to local economies. Strong performance in 2015 across the business has enabled Sky to continue to deliver considerable economic value in the UK with regard to the taxes it pays, the wages and benefits received by Sky people and the investment of funds in the broader community.

We increased our total shareholder return once again as we significantly outperformed the FTSE 100. Since 2010, we’ve delivered an average of 12% total shareholder returns per year compared to the FTSE 100 which has delivered just 10%.

Our operating costs reflect the money we pay to our suppliers.

The value of our community contribution has increased, reflecting the commitments we have made through Sky Academy. See Community contribution data on page 2 for more detail.

04Sky plc


Economic value distributed continued

Economic value distributed*2013/14 2014/15

Total tax contribution (£m)*1 237 251

Operating expenses (£m)*2 6,232 8,621

Group employee benefits (£m)*3 1,044 1,334

Total shareholder return (%)4 18.4% 18.8%

Notes

* Statutory, but excluding exceptional and one-off items

1. From continuing operations. Adjusted operating profit for the group, excludes exceptional or one-off items.

2. Includes wages and salaries, social security costs, costs of employee share option schemes and contributions to the Group’s pension schemes.

3. Total shareholder return represents the change in value of a share held for the 12 months to 30 June, assuming that dividends are re-invested to purchase additional shares at the closing price applicable on the ex-dividend date. The value of the share is based on the average share price over the three months prior to 30 June.

4. Amount invested directly in the community through funding, volunteering and mentoring services. Calculated according to the London Benchmarking Group framework and independently verified by Corporate Citizenship.



01Sky plc

Customer service In a fast-moving market with an ever greater choice of products

and providers, we believe our capability in service delivery gives us

a competitive advantage.

Our main focus for 2015 has been on building out our digital capabilities

in service, simplifying the customer experience whilst improving efficiency.

In the UK and Ireland, where our strategy is most advanced, we succeeded

in reducing the number of calls to our service centres by 11%, as record

numbers of customers interacted with us online, via our service app, or

through our automated voice service. We ended the year with twice as

many visits to our online help centre as calls to our service centres.

At the same time, we closed the year with customer satisfaction at a

record high. This was reflected in the latest Ofcom survey which showed Sky leading the market on customer

satisfaction with the fewest complaints across TV, broadband and home phone services.

In Italy, we reduced our calls per customer by 12% over the year as we moved more customer interactions

online with downloads to our self-service mobile app. Meanwhile, we almost doubled customer satisfaction

scores on the prior year. Both of our businesses in Germany and Italy also achieved significantly increased

customer loyalty, thanks to continued investment in the customer experience.

We delivered the lowest churn in 11 years, at less than 10% in each market. Churn is a good measure

of customer loyalty, which is a key driver of value for our business.

Churn

2013 2014 2015 2013 2014 2015 2013 2014 2015

10.2% 10.9%9.8%

12.3%

10.4%

8.6%

13.9%

10.3%9.6%

Germany & AustriaUK & Ireland Italy

110 bps 180 bps 70 bps

BP – Data Sheet – Customers

Churn represents the number of total customers during the year who terminated their subscriptions, net of former customers who reinstated their subscription (within 12 months of terminating their original subscription), expressed as a percentage of total average customers.

Highlights

Customers | Customer service | Access service provision | Programming complaints

CustomersRESPONSIBLE BUSINESS

Sky leads the market based on Ofcom’s recent survey on customer satisfaction, with the fewest complaints across TV, broadband and home phone services.

Customer

<10% Churn

in each of our markets

02Sky plc


Access service provisionThe table below shows our performance across the Sky channels on which we provide access services –

subtitling and audio description – against Ofcom’s access services quotas over the past four years.

This year we have again exceeded our regulated quotas for access services provision: we provided voluntary

access services on non-regulated channels, and increased the overall percentage of provision from last year.

For subtitles, we achieved 90% provision across 26 Sky channels, 24 of which were regulated. For audio

description we achieved 27% provision across 23 Sky channels, 22 of which were regulated.

We report on our performance against all regulated channels to Ofcom on a quarterly basis. The quota

required from Ofcom varies across the channels which are regulated. Our target is defined by taking an

average of the quota across all of the regulated channels, and our performance in this report is defined by

our average level of provision across regulated and voluntary channels.

Access service provision against Ofcom requirementsPrevious

target12012/132, 3 2013/144 2014/15

target12014/155, 6

Achieved Achieved Achieved

Subtitling (%) 70 73 82 73 90

Audio Description (%) 10 21 22 10 27

1. Average Ofcom quota required across regulated channels. The targets change based on the viewership a channel has in a given year and how established the channel is.

2. Subtitling: Average across Sky News, Sky 1, Sky Sports 1, Sky Sports News, Sky Movies Premier (all regulated).

3. Audio description: Average across Sky 1, Sky Sports 1 and Sky Movies Premiere; Sky News and Sky Sports News are exempt; we do not provide the voluntary level of 20% audio description on Sky Sports because the majority of live sport is already commentated upon.

4. Average across all Sky-owned channels where Sky provides access services (24 channels in 2013/14).

5. Average across all Sky-owned channels where Sky provides regulated or voluntary access services (26 channels for subtitles, and 23 channels for AD). This year, we aligned with the Ofcom reporting requirement and excluded promos from the reporting data. We also aligned our calendar with Ofcom reporting period, ranging from 30 December 2013 to 4 January 2015.

6. This year, we aligned with the Ofcom reporting requirement and excluded promos from the reporting data.

Programming complaintsWe are committed to ensuring we maintain the highest content standards on our TV channels and online

services. We aim to follow the Ofcom Broadcasting Code at all times and ensure that all programming and

promotional activity is fully compliant before transmission. We also aim to ensure our advertising meets

Ofcom’s COSTA Code criteria for advertising time in a clock hour and the number of breaks in programmes.

Between July 2014 and June 2015 the number of complaints via the Regulator about Sky programming

increased to 107, compared with 90 in the previous year. On receiving a complaint, Ofcom request the content

in order to work out whether they want to further investigate any possible breaches of the Code. Compared to

last year, complaints regarding Sky entertainment content were nearly par, while sports and news

programming complaints increased.

Across all the Sky channels we had only one breach of the Ofcom Broadcasting Code – Section 1.14. This was for

a strong swearword in a pre-watershed programme, in July 2014, which happened as a result of a technical

error during the editing process. There were no other breaches.

Most complaints on sports channels have been regarding the bad language used at live sports events. While

Sky has no control over the actions of the supporters or the players at such events, we do try and minimise

any offence with careful placement and manipulation of microphones at stadiums and auditoriums to avoid

the more colourful language making it to air. The presenters will also apologise to viewers if an unexpected

incident occurs.

03Sky plc


Programming complaints continued

There have been no Ofcom COSTA breaches relating to the length of advertising time on our channels. The

rules state that we cannot transmit more than 12 minutes of advertising in one clock hour. The teams involved

are pleased that the processes we have put in place to stem these types of errors have been successful across

all of Sky’s channels.

Complaints relating to Sky programming reported to OfcomContent area 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Complaints Entertainment 64 50 51

Sports 26 31 37

News 13 9 19

Total 103 90 107

Investigations concluded and upheld Entertainment 5 1 1

Sports 1 0 0

News 2 0 0

Total 8 1 1

Complaints relating to Ofcom 12 minute clock hour for advertisingContent area 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Incidents Entertainment 3 0 0

Sports 3 2 0

News 1 0 0

Total 6 2 0

Investigations concluded and upheld Entertainment 1 0 0

Sports 0 0 0

News 1 0 0

Total 2 0 0



01Sky plc

People| Gender diversity | Employee diversity | On-screen diversity | Health, safety and wellbeing | Staff engagement | Payroll giving and match funding | Training and development

Gender diversityWe believe diverse teams produce better business outcomes and

continue to champion diversity across all areas of our business.

We believe highlighting our work to improve gender diversity will help

drive the diversity agenda throughout our business. Although we have

some way to go, we have made good progress. This year, we are reporting

Group gender diversity for the first time. We are building on our strong

foundation of 35% female employees with the objective of achieving a

50/50 gender balance over time. We’re also committed to extending the

gender diversity of our Board; and of the non-executive directors we’ve

appointed across the past three years, 40% are women (2 of 5).

Our commitments include the development and support of our

executive pipeline with our Women in Leadership initiative. We are also

empowering our people to take more control of when and where they

work, as well as providing support through key life stages, such as

market-leading maternity pay and childcare vouchers.

As at 30 June 2015, the table below demonstrates diversity throughout

the Group:

Male Female

Board of Directors1,2 12 86% 2 14%

Senior managers1,2 278 76% 86 24%

All employees2,3 17,881 65% 9,562 35%

1. As defined in the Companies Act 2006. A senior manager is a person who has ‘responsibility for planning, directing or controlling the activities of the company, or a strategically significant part of the Company’. At Sky, senior managers are represented through the Reward Leadership Bonus Group.

2. Independently assured by Deloitte LLP.

3. Based on full-time equivalent employees from continuing operations and excluding people who work for our joint ventures.

PeopleRESPONSIBLE BUSINESS

Sky has a talented workforce and we continue to champion diversity across all areas of the business, including our Women in Leadership initiative.

Diversity

35%female employees

across the Group

Highlights

02Sky plc

People | Gender diversity | Employee diversity | On-screen diversity | Health, safety and wellbeing | Staff engagement | Payroll giving and match funding | Training and development

Employee diversityThe Company treats all people equally, fairly, with respect and without prejudice. Decisions about people’s

employment with the Company are based on ability, qualifications and performance. This principle also applies

when the Company makes decisions about development, promotion, pay and benefits.

The Company delivers some of the most diverse content and services available to a wide range of consumers

and it values the same diversity within the business and promotes a culture of opportunity for all, regardless

of background. The Company does not tolerate unfair treatment or discrimination at work based on ethnicity,

gender, age, religion, disability or sexual orientation.

Employee type in the UK and Ireland

2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Female employees (%)1 36 34 34

Female employees in senior management (%)2 – 26 27

Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic employees (BAME) (%)3 14 14 13

Disabled employees (%)3 3 5 5

1. Based on FTE employees from continuing operations and excluding people who work for our joint ventures.

2. A senior manager is a person who has ‘responsibility for planning, directing or controlling the activities of the company, or a strategically significant part of the Company’. At Sky, senior managers are represented through the Reward Leadership Bonus Group.

3. The total number of employees for Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) and disabled employees is calculated in ‘Heads’ which includes permanent, fixed-term contractors and ad hoc employees from continuing operations. Employees who work for the joint ventures, such as National Geographic and History Channel, are excluded from this figure.

On-screen diversityEncouraging diversity and inclusion in our industry is something that’s important to Sky. As part of this, we ask

the UK-based independent production companies that we work with on our entertainment programming to

sign up to the Creative Diversity Network (CDN) pledge. The CDN pledge is a public commitment by

independent production companies, in-house producers and other suppliers to take measurable steps to

improve diversity in the TV industry.

When production companies complete pre-production compliance documentation, we ask them to

self-declare whether they are signed up to the pledge, and provide evidence they have done so. Through

this process, we aimed once again for 100% of our independent production companies to have signed up

by the end of 2014/15 and have met this goal.

On-screen diversity in the UK and Ireland2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Independent production companies we work with signed up to Creative Diversity Network pledge (%)1

84 100 100

1. Does not include companies with less than five employees, or are not based in the UK.

Diversity of Sky people in UK and Ireland 7,633 7,508 7,458

2,654 2,875 2,873

728 1,064 1,114

8,000

6,000

4,000

2,000

0Black, Asian and

Minority Ethnic (BAME)Female Disabled

employees

Emp

loye

es (n

um

ber

s)

2012/13

2013/14

2014/15

03Sky plc

Health, safety and wellbeingThis year, Sky has achieved the lowest accident rate and the lowest

number of reportable incidents since we revamped our approach

to health and safety reporting five years ago. This reflects the

improvements we’ve made in both incident and near-miss reporting

with a fully integrated online reporting process. This has allowed us to

undertake proactive trend analysis and therefore more comprehensive

work to prevent incidents occurring/reoccurring within the business.

The Executive Governance Group for Occupational Health and Safety

at Sky has reviewed our approach and has determined that the most

responsible way forward for Sky is to set a target of zero reportable

incidents across our operations. To support this we have started a fresh drive with our people to make

the safety culture at Sky even better. Through the Choose Safety campaign we want to instil a safety

culture across the business that means the highest standard of safety is second nature and is

consistently part of how we do business at Sky.

This year Sky has been driving the safety performance of our major campus redevelopment in Osterley.

We have delivered 80,000m² of new accommodation for the business with only two reportable incidents

in our contractor community during the 1.5 million hours worked on the project.

1. Independently assured by Deloitte LLP

76

101

72

150

50

100

02013/142012/13 2014/15

Tota

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f re

po

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cid

ents

Total number of reportable incidents


Absence due to illness

4.0% 4.1% 4.1%

5%

3%

2%

1%

4%

0%2012/132011/12 2014/15

Ab

sen

ce d

ue

to il

lnes

s(%

)



Our lowest accident rate in five years, which reflects the improvements we’ve made and our fully integrated online reporting process.

Health and Safety

0.18accident rate per

100,000 hours worked

0.200.25

0.18

0.5

0.3

0.4

0.2

0.1

0.02014/15

Acc

iden

ts

(per

100

,00

0 h

ou

rs w

ork

ed)

2013/142012/13

Accident rate per 100,000 hours worked1

04Sky plc


Staff engagementWe measure how people feel about working for Sky through our people survey because this helps us to

improve how we work.

Over the past year, we implemented a new engagement index which has enabled us to better identify the key

elements of life at Sky that really make a difference to how our employees feel about our company. With the

new index, this means the score from previous years is not directly comparable to 2014/15, however across all

three years, engagement exceeds the benchmark score for UK companies as shown in the table below.

Employee engagement (UK & Ireland)Year Score compared to UK national norm (% higher)

2014/151 23

2013/142 6

2012/132 13

1. Using Aon methodology.2. Using Towers Watson methodology.

Payroll giving and match fundingOn average, 4% of staff gave through their payroll to charity over the past year and 5% of staff applied to

have their fundraising donation for charity matched.

We’ve been working to inspire and support our people to raise money for Sky Rainforest Rescue, our

partnership with WWF to help save one billion trees in the Amazon. We match donations that people make

to this charity, and other charities our people care about, pound for pound up to £300 per person.

Over the past year, we have encouraged staff to share their fundraising experiences through our

today@sky intranet and Chatter channels, resulting in raised awareness and an increased number of match

funding applications.

We have seen a drop in the number of donors for payroll giving this year, so we’re planning an employee

engagement campaign in 2014/15 encouraging employees to enter a competition to get 10 colleagues signed

up to payroll giving to win a prize donation to their charity of choice.

Our targets are 5% of Sky employees signed up for payroll giving and 5% of Sky employees applying for match

funding as a result of fundraising for charity, based on full-time equivalent employees at the beginning of the

financial year.

% of Sky employees applying for match funding as a result of fundraising for charity

0

5

2

5

4

3

1

2

02013/142012/13 2014/15

Emp

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es a

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BP – Data Sheet – People – Match funding% of Sky employees signed up to payroll giving

5 5

4

5

4

3

2

1

02013/142012/13 2014/15

Emp

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BP – Data Sheet – People – Sta� participation

05Sky plc


Training and developmentOur people are critical to our success, and in a fast-moving industry, we

know that success comes from a willingness to embrace change. We

want to encourage our people to strive for continual improvement in

everything that they do. We aim to foster a culture where our people

can do their best work every day, fulfil their potential and achieve great

things together. To help them progress, we provide a wide range of

opportunities for development.

Our new Sky Development portal supports our overall training and development strategy of ‘better self;

better team; and better business’. It recognises the different ways people learn, offering e-learning, online

seminars, and video content. Each month up to 10,000 learning activities were completed via this portal in the

UK & Ireland. Similarly, in Italy, we launched ‘The DNA of Sky’, linked to our intranet, SkyWorld, which brings to

life our organisational culture and includes all our development initiatives. Eighteen per cent of staff took part

in these training initiatives in 2014/15. And in Germany, over 3,100 training hours were delivered through our

training academy. In 2015/16 we will be able to report on a full year of how employees are using the training and

development activities available on the portal, with further integration of our businesses in Germany, Austria,

and Italy.

Because we know that the quality of our leaders and managers has a big influence on performance and

engagement, we provide them with a range of tailored programmes such as our new training programme in

Germany and Austria, ‘Leaders@Sky’, and in the UK and Ireland, Sky Manager HD.

Learning and development is not just about formal training and as a large and diverse company, we also offer

our people the opportunity to broaden their experience through exposure to different parts of the business.

We actively encourage internal moves and job rotations at all levels of the organisation, from project work and

short-term placements, to new full-time roles. This helps us to build a broader skills base and strengthens

collaboration across departments.

In 2015/16 we will be able to report on a full year of how employees are using the training and development

activities available on the portal, therefore at present we are not focussing on the metric of ‘average amount

spent per employee’, as we are focussed on what is being achieved by the learning and development as

opposed to applying a monetary figure.

Sky employees taking part in a training and development course2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Proportion of employees receiving annual training and development reviews (%) 88 91 93

Average amount spent per employee (£) 390 342 n/a

Training & development

10,000up tolearning activities are completed via our online portal each month

01Sky plc

Environment overviewOur environment strategy is threefold: to reduce our carbon footprint;

to make our products more sustainable; and to use our position as a

leading media and communications company to raise awareness and

drive positive change on environmental issues amongst our business

partners, and to inspire action amongst our customers through Sky

Rainforest Rescue.

Now with our expanded group, we will align our environment strategies

across our territories, building on the commitments we have already

made in the UK and Ireland. We have already established our carbon

footprint for the group and will review our targets over the coming year.

Detailed commentary about our progress is provided within this

document for our carbon measures, which are our leading indicators, as

well as progress against the rest of our targets. Our commentary

includes baseline data.

Group carbon emissionsIn the UK, we have been reporting and assuring our environmental performance since 2006, well ahead of the

mandatory disclosures of greenhouse gas emissions required under the Companies Act from 2013. We have

reduced our emissions relative to revenue (tCO2e/£m) across the UK and Ireland by 38% since our 2008

baseline, meaning we are on track to meet our target of halving our emissions relative to revenue (tCO2e/£m)

by 2020. In addition, even with the significant growth in our business, we are maintaining a reduction in

absolute carbon emissions from our 2008 baseline.

With the continued development of our new west London campus, our new buildings and our leased buildings

were both still operational over the 2014/15 year. It was therefore challenging to keep our energy use and

carbon emissions lower than in the year before. However, as new buildings are BREEAM Excellent and have a

number of smart, sustainable initiatives, we expect to see energy demand reduce in the future. We also

continue to exceed the industry benchmark for the energy efficiency of our data centres which will help us

manage energy demand as our business needs increase. We remain committed to our long-term investments,

for example in renewable energy, and are exploring ways to further complement our existing on-site solar,

wind, biomass and Combined Cooling and Heating Plant renewable energy generation.

Highlights

EnvironmentRESPONSIBLE BUSINESS

We are now rolling out our UK environmental strategy across Europe, starting with reporting on our Group carbon emissions.

Environment

11.42 tCO2e/£m revenue for the Group

Environment | Environment overview | Group carbon emissions | Net emissions | Carbon offsetting | Fewer impacts | Gross emissions | More sustainable products | Products recycling | Bigger reach | Building energy efficiency | Renewable energy

| Fleet fuel emissions | Travel | Waste | Water use

02Sky plc

Net emissionsWe classify our net emissions as the energy that we do not procure from a renewable energy source. Typically,

this amounts to small quantities of residual energy at sites where we have less influence over the source of

energy procured, e.g. landlorded sites.

In the UK, the majority of our energy is provided by either our own on-site renewable energy plants or through

a renewable energy tariff with Scottish and Southern Energy Group. Scottish and Southern retain, on our

behalf, Levy Exemption Certificates and a Renewable Energy Guarantee of Origin. This ensures that the energy

we use can be traced back to its place of production. This year we’ve seen an increase in our net electricity

emissions which is mainly down to improved reporting practices, as we’ve included all landlorded sites in our

net emissions this year. However, our CCHP and wind turbine have continued to contribute to heating, cooling

and powering Sky Studios, still Europe’s most sustainable broadcasting facility. Together with our biomass

boilers in Scotland, this year 6% of our energy requirements from Sky-owned sites were obtained from on-site

renewable energy. We would have expected a greater percentage, but our CCHP was turned off for four

months due to maintenance. We also expect the solar panels that have been installed into our new buildings

as part of the Campus development to be officially commissioned shortly.

In Germany, the district heating used for heating at our main site is produced by geothermal sources. Similarly,

the energy for our main site and customer service centres are procured from a 100% renewable tariff.

Conversely in Italy, no renewable energy is purchased at this point in time.

Carbon offsetting Our first priority is to reduce our gross carbon emissions before offsetting, and to invest in both on-site

renewable energy and energy procured from renewable sources. For the remaining unavoidable gross

emissions, our carbon neutral status is achieved through the voluntary purchase of verified offsets from

The CarbonNeutral Company. We offset our total gross CO2e emissions, including Scope 1 and 2 and selected

gross Scope 3 emissions from waste, and business air and car travel across the Sky Group. For the 2014/15

reporting year we have offset 149,913 tonnes of CO2e emissions. The full list of projects which the company has

supported financially through the purchasing of carbon offsets is available to view in our Carbon Neutral Policy

found on our website corporate.sky.com/bigger-picture/sustainability-reporting/policies

Sky group-wide carbon emissions and carbon intensity 2014/15This year, we established our group-wide carbon intensity of 11.42 tCO2e/£m of Group revenue. The table on

the following page shows our total carbon emissions and our carbon intensity at Group level as well as by the

territories in which we operate.



03Sky plc

Carbon offsetting continued

Sky Group UK and Ireland

Germany and Austria

Italy

Gross absolute carbon emissions (tCO2e)1, 2, 3, 4

SCOPE 1 27,145 22,361 2,119 2,665

Fuel combustion (gas, diesel generators, fuel oil, vehicles)

– Diesel 668 607 1 60

– Fuel oil5 54 n/a 54 n/a

– Gas 4,502 4,344 n/a 158

– Vehicle-fuel 21,226 16,933 2,064 2,229

Operation of facilities (refrigerants)

– Refrigerants 695 477 0 218

SCOPE 2 101,674 77,363 3,248 21,063

Purchased district heating net6 184 n/a 112 72

Purchased district heating gross 485 n/a 413 72

Purchased electricity net7 38,649 15,572 2,086 20,991

Purchased electricity gross 101,187 77,361 2,835 20,991

Purchased steam 2 2 n/a n/a

Total (Scope 1 and 2) net CO2e (tCO2e) 65,980 37,935 4,317 23,728

Total (Scope 1 and 2) gross CO2e (tCO2e) 128,819 99,724 5,367 23,728

Joint Ventures contribution to total net and gross CO2e (tCO2e)8 138 138 n/a n/a

Carbon intensity

Revenue (£m) 11,283 7,820 1,377 2,086

Carbon intensity (tCO2e/£m revenue) 11.42 12.75 3.90 11.37

1. Emissions are for the full financial year (1 July 2014–30 June 2015) including the period prior to acquisition.

2. We measure our CO2e emissions according to the Greenhouse Gas Protocol, the global standard for reporting greenhouse gas emissions. Our total gross CO2e emissions include all direct Greenhouse Gas emissions; and our net emissions include the energy that we do not procure from a renewable energy source. Our net emissions are those remaining after deducting the renewable energy procured from a renewable energy tariff with Scottish and Southern Energy Group. Scottish and Southern retain, on our behalf, the Levy Exemption Certificates and Renewable Energy Guarantee of Origin (REGOs). In addition, we offset our total gross emissions through the purchase of Voluntary Carbon Standard offsets.

3. Our CO2e emissions data is independently assured by Deloitte LLP. More information about our environmental targets and performance can be found at sky.com/environment.

4. Historical data is recalculated each year in line with the latest guidelines to Defra/DECC’s Greenhouse Gas Conversion Factors for Company Reporting and restated accordingly.

5. Fuel Oil only used for heating by Sky in Germany.

6. District heating (i.e. heat obtained from a cogeneration plant) can be used as an alternative source of heat to gas. Sky in Italy and Germany purchase district heating. In the UK, Sky does not purchase any district heating as it generates its own heat from an onsite biomass plant.

7. Sky in Italy does not currently purchase electricity from a renewable electricity tariff and so there is no difference between their gross and net emissions.

8. Joint ventures are enterprises or business where Sky is the majority shareholder (>50%).



04Sky plc

Fewer impactsThe table below summarises our progress in relation to our environment targets to 2020. Commentary about

our performance on our leading measures - gross and net emissions - is explained on the following pages.

Summary performance against environment targetsTarget 2008/09 2009/10 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Reduction in gross CO2e emissions relative to revenue(%)1

50 0 -8 -21 -33 -38 -40 -38

Increase in energy efficiency across all buildings (%)2

20 – – – * Baseline established

10 5

Energy obtained from owned or controlled renewable energy at Sky-owned sites(%)3

20 – – – 2* 6 7 6

Increase in fleet fuel efficiency(%)4 15 – – – Baseline established*

5 11 11

Reduction in CO2e emissions from travel per full time equivalent (FTE) employee (%)5

20 – -2 -11 -13 9 17 -8

Waste sent to landfill from our main offices (%)6

0 36 33 9 8 10 6 6

Waste recycled from all Sky sites(%)7

65 60 61 67 70 62 65 62

Food waste recycled from our main offices (%)8

100 – – – * 100 100 100

Water consumption (m3/FTE)9 9m3–11m3 8 8 9 6 8 7 9

1. 50% reduction in gross CO2e emissions relative to revenue (tonnes/£million) by 2020 versus a 2008/09 baseline.

2. Increase energy efficiency by an average of 20% across all buildings by setting energy performance targets by 2020 versus a 2012/13 baseline.

3. Sky-owned sites to obtain 20% of their energy consumption from owned or controlled renewables by 2020 versus a 2008/09 baseline.

4. Increase in fleet fuel efficiency by 15% by 2020 versus a 2011/12 baseline.

5. Reduce CO2e emissions from travel per full-time equivalent (FTE) employee by 20% by 2020 versus a 2008/09 baseline.

6. Achieve zero waste to landfill at our main offices by 2020.

7. Maintain a recycling rate of 65% across Sky.

8. Recycling 100% of food waste at our main offices by composting and anaerobic digestion methods.

9. Maintaining the efficient use of water at our sites in line with good practice +/- 1m3 from 10m3/FTE.

* New targets set in November 2012.

** Established management processes to enable assurance in 2014/15.



05Sky plc

Gross emissionsWe have reported and assured our environmental performance since 2008, and in that time have reduced our

emissions relative to revenue (tCO2e/£m) across Sky’s UK and Ireland territories by 38%. We remain on track to

meet our target of halving our emissions relative to revenue (tCO2e/£m) by 2020. This year however, our

emissions have slightly increased to the previous year (due to the continued development of our new west

London campus whilst still leasing old buildings), but we are still well below our 2008/09 baseline.

Our ongoing integration of energy efficiency measures and renewable energy across our property portfolio all

support a pathway to reduced energy demand in the future. We also continue to exceed the industry

benchmark for the energy efficiency of our data centres which will help us manage energy demand as our

business needs increase.

We remain committed to our long-term investments, for example in renewable energy, and are exploring ways

to further complement our existing on-site solar, wind, biomass and Combined Cooling and Heating Plant

energy generation.

In addition to the effect of running leased buildings whilst developing our new west London campus, the slight

increase in gross electricity consumption has also been a consequence of a general increased demand across

our network sites and data centres, due to additional broadband requirements. Despite this, we continue to

exceed the industry benchmark for how we actually run and manage our data centres – i.e. their power usage

effectiveness (PUE). This is a ratio between the total building load and the IT load, and we’ve consistently

continued to improve year on year. Across four other building types, we’ve also seen an improvement in energy

efficiency. Our Office/Studios building type, however, slightly underperformed due to not receiving on-site

generated renewable energy from the CCHP as it was down for four months. This had

a knock-on impact on the amount of energy we needed to acquire off the grid.

Our environment data set has been re-baselined this year as we have become more thorough in our reporting

processes. This decision was made in order to follow best practice guidelines and also adopt new legal

requirements and as a result there has been a slight increase in our data set which has been reflected from the

baseline year. Relative performance year on year for our carbon-related targets has not significantly changed,

with the exception of employee travel (see separate commentary on travel in the following pages).

We continue to retain The Carbon Trust Standard for the fifth year, and were included in the Carbon Disclosure

Project’s (CDP) Performance Leadership Index as one of the top 500 worldwide firms effectively reducing its

carbon emissions, and commended by the CDP as leading on action against climate change with a position

also on the Climate Disclosure Leadership Index.

Net emissionsWe classify our net emissions as the carbon emissions associated with the energy procured from a non-

renewable source. Typically, this amounts to small amounts of residual energy at sites where we have less

influence over the source of energy procured (e.g. landlorded sites). In the UK, the majority of our energy is

provided by either our own on-site renewable energy plants or the rest we purchase from a renewable energy

tariff with Scottish and Southern Energy Group for which we retain the Renewable Energy Guarantees

of Origin (REGO).



06Sky plc

Gross emissions continued

This year we’ve seen an increase in our net carbon emissions which is mainly down to improved reporting

practices, as we’ve included all landlorded sites in our net emissions this year. Despite this, our CCHP and wind

turbine have continued to contribute to heating, cooling and powering our sustainable broadcasting facility,

Sky Studios. Together with our biomass boilers in Scotland, this year 6% of our energy requirements from

Sky-owned sites were obtained from on-site renewable energy. We would have expected a greater percentage,

but our CCHP was turned off for four months due to extended maintenance works. We also expect the solar

panels that have been installed into our new buildings as part of the campus development to be officially

commissioned shortly and will also increase the quantity of renewable energy generated on-site.

As this is the first year we have incorporated data from Germany and Austria, and Italy, going forward as we

implement a group-wide environment strategy we will be reporting trends and changes across our five territories.

Performance against our gross emissions target to halve our carbon emissions relative to revenue by 2020 (UK and Ireland)

Target 2008/09 (Baseline)

2009/10 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Reduction in gross CO2e emissions relative to revenue (%) (t/£m)

-50 0 -8 -21 -33 -38 -40 -38

Gross CO2e emissions relative to revenue (t/£m)

– 20.7 19.1 16.3 13.9 12.9 12.4 12.81


Gross Scope 1 and 2 emissions (tCO2e) 2014/15

SCOPE 1Diesel 607

Gas 4,344

Vehicle fuel 16,933

SCOPE 2Energy from steam 2

Electricity gross 77,361

BP – Data Sheet – Environment – Emissions – Gross Scope 1 and 2 emissions



Gross carbon emissions (Scope 1 and 2 – UK and Ireland)

20.6019.10

16.3013.90 12.80

12.40 12.752020 Target

25.00

15.00

20.00

10.00

5.00

0.002009/102008/09

(Baseline)2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

CO

2 em

issi

on

s (t

/£m

)

BP – Data Sheet – Environment – Gross Carbon Emissions

07Sky plc


Scope 3 emissionsEach year, in the UK and Ireland we work with our business partners to increase the Scope 3 emissions and we

report and maintain a proactive approach to managing those emissions outside of our direct control. We

continue to commission Trucost, an established environmental data provider, to comprehensively measure

and analyse Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions from our suppliers. This year Trucost has again reviewed the

carbon footprint of our suppliers (almost 3,000 in total), using expenditure data from July 2014 to June 2015.

They identified which areas of our supply chain had the highest environment impact and therefore where we

had the greatest opportunities for reducing our emissions. We found that Sky’s Scope 3 emissions are

concentrated in a relatively small number of suppliers. So we’re continuing to target the top 50 most carbon

intensive suppliers and will encourage them to partake in the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) Supply Chain

programme next year, our sixth consecutive year. This year we again hosted a series of webinars as part of the

current year’s programme to help both first time, and previous respondents understand the importance of

disclosure and find out how we can help to support business emission reductions.

Absolute gross emissions (Scope 1 and 2) – UK and Ireland1

2008/09 (Baseline)

2009/10 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

SCOPE 1 (tCO2e) Diesel 62 122 182 487 592 606 607

Gas 4,871 5,126 4,156 4,267 4,147 4,149 4,344

Vehicle fuel 13,621 16,748 17,846 15,569 15,410 15,469 16,933

Refrigerants 1,821 1,469 915 616 280 382 477

Total Scope 1 emissions 20,322 23,465 23,098 20,939 20,429 20,633 22,361

SCOPE 2 (tCO2e)Energy from steam 0 23 4 17 21 3 2

Electricity net 15,614 20,811 11,696 3,502 4,701 1,803 15,572

Electricity gross emissions 85,517 85,329 84,192 73,660 72,518 73,784 77,361

Total Scope 2 emissions 85,517 85,352 84,196 73,677 72,539 73,787 77,363

Total net emissions (Scope 1 and 2) 35,935 44,276 35,067 24,442 25,130 22,436 37,935

Total gross emissions (Scope 1 and 2) 105,839 108,817 107,294 94,617 92,968 94,420 99,724

Joint Ventures contribution to total net and gross CO2e (tCO2e) 118 115 114 103 103 138

Revenue (£m) 5,121 5,709 6,597 6,791 7,235 7,632 7,820

1. All previously reported figures have been restated in accordance with the latest Defra/DECC’s Greenhouse Gas Conversion Factors for company reporting. We also restated these based on an increased scope of sites.



08Sky plc


Total Scope 3 gross emissions – upstream and downstream assessed by TrucostScope 3 Emissions GHG emissions (tCO2e) 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Upstream3 Purchased goods and services2 258,544 270,839 257,092

Capital goods 105,513 148,167 123,088

Employee commuting 14,397 15,995 14,536

Transportation and distribution 12,924 16,726 13,448

Business travel 11,211 13,297 15,018

Leased assets 172 n/a n/a

Fuel- and energy-related activities 3,425 9,823 8,324

Waste generated in operations 98 96 133

Total Upstream 406,283 474,943 431,637

Downstream4 Use of sold products 2,388,870 2,381,385 2,364,108

Transportation and distribution 13,371 12,557 14,199

End-of-life treatment of sold products 82 82 81

Total Downstream 2,402,323 2,394,024 2,378,388

Total Upstream and Downstream 2,808,606 2,868,967 2,810,025

1. All previously reported figures have been restated in accordance with the latest Defra/DECC’s Greenhouse Gas Conversion Factors for company reporting. We also restated these based on an increased scope of sites.

2. Electricity consumed in BT Openreach Exchanges (Local-loop unbundling) generates a large proportion of our Scope 3 emissions. We therefore feel it is important to monitor the emissions from these exchanges separately from the Trucost assessment to better understand our footprint. Our broadband business has seen significant growth over the past few years, and this trend continued this year with a 20% increase in emissions from 53,438 in 2013/14 to 64,824 tCO2e in 2014/15.

3. Direction in a supply chain opposite to the flow of materials; activities pre manufacturing.

4. The direction in which materials flow; activities post manufacturing.



09Sky plc

More sustainable productsTo improve the sustainability of our products each year, we have set ourselves a series of commitments.

The following table reflects our performance against our goals to lead the way with better, more sustainable

products in the UK and Ireland.

This year we continue to focus on incremental changes to the current product set and on the later phases

of the product life-cycle, from distribution, maintenance and install, through to end of life. We know there

is still a lot to do, and here is a flavour of what we have achieved this year.

Better products charterCommitments Progress 2014/15 Comments

Designing sustainability into our products at the concept stage

On track We continue to put sustainability considerations at the heart of every product design decisions, with iterative mini-Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) exercises measuring the impact of any proposed changes. Creating a full peer-reviewed LCA report is also now a requirement to the Sign-off process of Sky-designed products. We have undertaken a number of workshops for product designers, to ensure best recycling practice is built into all product design. We initiated the development of a Standard (IEEE 1680.6) to drive best practice in the eco-design of Pay TV Set-Top Boxes. The worldwide standard, which Sky chairs, is in development with over 30 working group members to date and expects to be completed over the course of the next two years.

Reducing the Total Energy Consumption (TEC) of new set-top boxes and routers

On track We know that the use phase of the set-top box life-cycle is the most carbon intensive part of its life because of the energy it uses in customers’ homes. We therefore ensured appropriate manual and automatic standby and eco-modes were part of the Sky+HD box design and have continued to improve their configuration over time, to fit in with the way our customers use their set-top box. This meant that although Version 2 of the Sky+HD Box launched in August 2013 introduced built in Wi-Fi, we were still able to reduce the total energy consumption of the set-top box by 20% compared to Version 1 with the introduction of the automatic eco-mode savings. This year, we remotely updated all Sky+HD boxes to extend the overnight automatic eco-mode timing by 50%, further reducing the total energy consumption of the boxes. Sky plays a proactive role in industry bodies. Sky founded and continues to chair the European Voluntary Agreement to improve the energy efficiency of Pay Television (Complex) Set-Top Boxes. This Voluntary Agreement uses Total Energy Consumption (TEC) as its unit of measure which represents the energy usage of the device over the course of an entire year, taking into account the base functionality of the box, and it continues to drive TEC improvements, with a new TEC tier coming into effect on 1 July 2016.

Measure the cradle-to-grave impact for our products in terms of impact on climate change and set further KPIs using a cradle-to-grave approach

On track We've continued to work with the consultancy Environmental Resources Management (ERM) in the use of LCAs on new products launched and embed the findings of these assessments.

Use less natural resources in manufacturing

On track Further to the improvements made between the Sky Hub and Sky Hub 2 last year, where a number of materials were designed out, we launched Version 3 of the Sky+HD box in August 2014 which further optimised its design, resulting in reduced material use and lighter product weight.

Increasing the use of recycled content and closed-loop recycling

On track We have continued to ensure that 100% of all products that are returned to Sky are reused or recycled with particular focus on increasing the number of products that are reused. In our own refurbishment and repair process, we respray and reuse set-top box covers and other electronic components as much as possible. When this is not possible, we find a way to give 80% of faulty and out of warranty hard drives a second life on the second-hand market as they get wiped, repaired and white labelled.

Reducing carbon emissions resulting from production, distribution, install and maintenance

On track Our In Life Router programme looks at the performance of the product to reduce the number of replacement routers that we send out to customers. Through a combination of customer service training, improving network connectivity, enabling remote fixes and improving self-set-up instructions, we have managed to significantly reduce the number of replacement boxes sent out to customers. This has a significant impact in terms of reducing carbon emissions resulting from production, distribution, install and maintenance.



10Sky plc

Products recyclingTwo years ago we set ourselves the target to reuse or recycle 100% of our products that are returned to us by

our customers. This means that we either reuse or recycle everything we take back from a customer home so

that we don’t send anything to landfill.

We work closely with our logistics partner, UTL, to maximize the amount of products that are returned to Sky

from customers’ homes, and have trialled ways of incentivising customers to return to us equipment they no

longer need so it can be repaired and reused. Once UTL receive the products they are segregated by type and

then classified into three main groups: refurbishment, repair and end-of-life recycling.

When a box breaks down, instead of supplying a new box, when available, a refurbished ‘A-Grade’ box is given to

the customer. Their own box is then refurbished and added to the A-grade stock. This loop within the value

chain significantly reduces both electronic waste and the manufacturing of new boxes.

For those boxes that can’t be refurbished, we recycle; none of it goes to landfill. We work with partners to

repair hard drives where possible, in order to give them a second life in the second-hand market, and the

different types of plastics and metals are all recycled into useful materials.

We have a further commitment to leave zero waste in customer homes which complements this target.

Products recyclingTarget 2013/141, 2 2014/152

Reuse or recycling of all Sky products returned to Sky (%) 100 100 100

1. Applicable from 1 January 2014.


Bigger reachAs a responsible business, we take action to both minimise our own environmental impact and to drive positive

change in areas outside of our direct control. Working with our suppliers to reduce the impact of our supply

chain improves our efficiency and helps us to reduce our indirect emissions. This year we’ve continued to

engage our internal product design team and suppliers to achieve efficiency improvements and made great

progress across the production industry, encouraging and creating improvements in the way we, and our

suppliers, make TV. We’ve fully embedded BAFTA’s industry tool, albert, within our commissioning process and

it is used to measure carbon emissions for all of our externally commissioned programmes. We use the results

to set genre-specific targets and are also using the next iteration of the tool, the sustainable production

certification albert+, on our leading genre programmes, to achieve reductions in their environmental impact.

We’ve also continued our long-term participation in the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) Supply Chain

Programme to engage with our key suppliers on climate change which we’ve been doing since 2010. This year

we continued to see a strong response rate with 64% of our selected suppliers disclosing, on average scoring a

disclosure score above the global CDP average. These suppliers reported a number of emissions reduction

activities, resulting in savings of around two million tonnes of CO2 and US$104 million in costs.



11Sky plc

Commitments Progress 2014/15 Comments

Work with key production companies to reduce the impact and associated emissions

Completed We’ve continued to use a carbon calculator tool, albert, for all externally commissioned programming at Sky. We have then set targets specific to each genre via the use of ‘Environment Checklists’. We’ve further embedded awareness and impact of programming via trialling albert+ across three different genre programmes. albert+ is a tool to not only measure but reduce carbon emissions associated with production.

Lead the way across our industry in promoting sustainable production

Completed We have continued our strong contribution within the sector via the BAFTA Sustainability Consortium and have worked with the National Film and Television School (NFTS) to promote the use of albert within their coursework material. We’ve also begun to use a logo on end screen credits to acknowledge awareness of sustainable production, for example our comedy series, Trollied.

Measure the carbon emissions associated with production across all genres and set production specific KPIs

Completed 100% of our productions commit to the delivery of a carbon footprint report via the use of albert.

Engage our top 50 most carbon intensive suppliers to publicly report their carbon emissions and targets through the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP)

Completed For the fifth consecutive year, we participated in the CDP Supply Chain programme, engaging our top 50 most carbon-intensive suppliers. 87% of responding suppliers reported their Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions and 83% set a reduction target. In total, a saving of two million tCO2e was achieved, producing a saving of US$104 million as a result of their emissions reduction initiatives.

Help small and local business suppliers understand and reduce their environmental impacts

On track By working in partnership with Mace Construction we’ve been supporting local businesses through a number of volunteering events, and donating materials and furniture. Together we’ve provided timber waste to Community Wood Recycling for local projects and re-homed chairs, desks, and canvas marquees with local businesses. We use local suppliers for more and more of our on-site catering, e.g. Lick, Brighton-based frozen yogurt supplier.

Continue to play a leadership role on key issues to address climate change

On track As members of the UK Corporate Leaders Group (CLG) and Aldersgate Group, we promote the drive for a sustainable economy and lobby for support of strong policies on climate change.

Building energy efficiencyWe started reporting on our energy efficiency across seven main building types in 2012/13, categorising them in

line with CIBSE guidelines but tailored to Sky-specific requirements. We measure the efficiency of all of our

building types in terms of the amount of energy they use per square metre apart from data centres, where

efficiency is measured by the specific industry standard, Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE).

Since our baseline year, we’ve increased our energy efficiency on average by 5% across these building types.

More specifically this year, five of the seven building types showed an improvement in energy efficiency with

call centres and data centres showing the most improvement. The studios however are underperforming due

to not receiving renewable energy from our on-site CCHP. Our technical spaces have also decreased in energy

efficiency due to an overall energy demand for increased broadband.

This year we re-baselined the data to exclude any sites that are estimated so that we are consistent and apply

this target to sites where we receive energy bills directly and are able to control the operation of the building.

Our target is to increase energy efficiency by an average of 20% across all building types by 2020.

Bigger reach continued



12Sky plc

Overall average energy consumption by building type 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15 Change in

energy efficiency (%)

Building type (kWh/sqft)

Office 27 23 26 4

Call centre 34 22 25 27

Studio 41 49 58 -43

Technical 133 141 144 -8

Warehouse 8 7 7 9

Training centre 13 10 10 20

Building type

Data (PUE)1, 2 1.79 1.46 1.33 26

Overall change in energy efficiency 5

1. Power usage effectiveness (PUE) is a metric developed by the Green Grid to measure the energy efficiency of data centres and is a ratio between the total building load and the IT load. The ideal Sky PUE is 1 (e.g. the only load observed in the data centre is generated by the IT equipment and no power is consumed to generate cold air or feed UPS etc). The average measured PUE in the data centre industry is 2.

2. Current average PUE for the four co-located data centres (Edinburgh 1, Edinburgh 2, Hemel, and Slough) is 1.33, exceeding the industry standard of 2.

Renewable energy Our wind turbine and biomass boilers have continued to contribute to the generation of on-site energy, but

unfortunately our CCHP was inoperable for four months this year whilst being serviced for an unexpected

engineering issue. This meant that the full potential of the CCHP wasn’t met which has impacted our overall

performance. This year we achieved 6% against our 20% target to obtain energy from owned or controlled

renewable sources at Sky-owned sites. However, despite the CCHP not being fully operational, we completed

the connections to buildings within the west London campus, ensuring that all heating can be utilised to

further reduce our CO2e emissions. Also, we successfully installed over 1,000m3 solar panels at our campus

but are waiting for them to become fully commissioned before reporting on them.

We continue to investigate Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) as an additional source of controlled off-site

renewable energy to help meet this target.


2009/10 2010/11 2011/121 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Energy obtained from owned or controlled renewables at Sky-owned sites (%)

20 2 * 6 7 6

On-site renewable energy (kWh) – 0 – – 2,348,152 6,543,089 7,719,139 5,788,585

1. Electricity, heating and cooling energy from CCHP plant operating for six months.

* New target set in November 2012.

Building energy efficiency continued



13Sky plc

Fleet fuel emissions Our van fleet emissions make up almost a fifth of our gross emissions. As this is a considerable chunk of our

total footprint, we want to make sure that all 3,000 vans are run as efficiently as possible. This is why we’ve set

ourselves a target to increase fleet fuel efficiency by 15% by 2020. So far, we’ve achieved an 11% improvement

from our baseline year, even during a period of acquiring our outsourced partners vans.

To achieve the remaining 4%, we will continue to invest in more energy efficient vans, including the

VW Transporter and VW Caddy, both of which are more energy efficient than previous models. The entire fleet

has been switched to more efficient vans, the first of which were introduced in 2012. The fleet team continually

work with van manufacturers to identify the most efficient vans, and the latest technology that will help to

deliver the sustainable remaining 4% improvement.

More efficient driving is another part of increasing fuel efficiency. We’ve already installed telematics in each of

our vans to provide information about driving behaviours to engineers and their managers. Now we’re setting

regional challenges between the teams of engineers to improve their efficiency, incentivising through various

competitions and Green Driving Awards. We’re always looking at our intelligent routing too, so that each day,

the route used by all our engineers is the most effective and streamlined as possible. We’re also seeing a

general trend as our online customer service improves that the number of engineer visits per customer

is reducing.

More broadly, we continue to actively encourage the industry to develop low-emission alternatives through

collaboration with other businesses, e.g. through membership of the UK Corporate Leaders Group on Climate

Change, and the Aldersgate Group.

Performance against our fleet efficiency targetTarget 2011/12

Baseline2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Increase in fleet fuel efficiency (%) 15 Baseline established*

5 11 11

Average overall fleet CO2 emissions(g/km) – 263 250 233 233

* New target set in November 2012.

Composition of on-site renewable energy

CCHP Osterley 2,930,467 kWh

Biomass boilers 2,790,533 kWh

Wind turbine 67,584 kWh

PV* 0 kWh

* Includes PVs (photovoltaic cells) but zero output as not yet fully commissioned.

Renewable energy continued



14Sky plc

TravelThis year, we‘ve seen a significant decrease in our emissions from travel and have achieved an 8% reduction

mainly due to a reduction in flights, which is the biggest contributing factor to our impacts from travel. We’ve

also improved our reporting methods and re-baselined our data to reflect a significant change in emission

factors – specifically the inclusion of radiative forcing in air travel.

We know that reducing our travel emissions continues to be a difficult area for us, especially with the

continuous growth of the business and now international distribution of our sites. To offset this, we continue

to make significant investments in alternatives to travel, such as Microsoft Office Lync and our own vis-à-vis suites

which create great opportunities for everyone to host meetings from their place of work. In the forthcoming

year we will also be allowing for even more alternative working approaches as we continue rolling out flexible

working practices.

Performance against our travel target1

2008/09 (Baseline)

2009/10 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Company cars (tCO2e) (Scope 1) 1,647 1,808 1,913 2,091 2,168 2,236 2,111

Sky Shuttle Bus (tCO2e) (Scope 1) 329 353 389 347 435 640 622

Air travel (tCO2e) (Scope 3) 7,891 8,555 7,186 7,661 10,962 12,891 10,422

Cars not company owned (tCO2e) (Scope 3) 2,818 3,068 3,504 4,027 5,702 6,373 4,209

Total emissions (tCO2e) 12,685 13,783 12,950 14,126 19,267 22,2140 17,365

Total full-time equivalents (FTE)1 13,951 15,440 16,006 17,937 19,413 20,841 20,829

Emissions from travel per full-time equivalent employee (tCO2e/FTE)

0.91 0.89 0.81 0.79 0.99 1.06 0.83

1. Full-time equivalent (FTE) employees include permanent employees, and those on fixed-term and adhoc hours employment contracts from continuing operations only. Exclude those employees who work for our joint ventures. For UK and Ireland.

2. Includes emissions within the company’s control (Scope 1 emissions) and emissions outside the company’s control (Scope 3).

Average overall CO2 emissions (grams/km)

2020 Target

250

263

233 233

280

260

240

220

2002012/132011/12

(Baseline)2013/14 2014/15

Ave

rage

ove

rall

flee

t C

O2

emis

sio

ns

(gra

ms/

km)

Fleet fuel emissions continued

Change in CO2 emissions from business travel compared to 2008/09 baseline

-5

25

15

5

0

-15

-252010/112009/10 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

2020 Target

20% reduction in CO2e emissions per FTE from employee business travel

2020 Target



15Sky plc

Waste This year we remain in line with achieving our waste targets – maintaining a 62% recycling rate across all our

sites (against our target of 65%), only sending 6% of our waste to landfill (against our target of zero waste to

landfill by 2020) and composting 100% of food waste from main offices. However, we want to push ourselves

to be as efficient and effective in our waste strategy as possible.

We continue to support our integrated services contractor as they manage the waste strategy with us and

work together to streamline processes. We’re re-looking at the management of our current bin segregation

whilst considering best collection and management methods. To support this, we’re planning an employee

engagement campaign to encourage long-term behaviour change and making sure any waste generated

goes into the right recycling bin.

All data has been re-baselined to include sites as we’ve improved our data reporting processes.

Performance against our waste target1


2009/10 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Waste sent to landfill from our main offices (%)1

0 36 33 9 8 10 6 6

Maintain a recycling rate of 65% across Sky (%)

65 60 61 67 70 62 65 62

Recycle 100% of food waste at our main offices (%)

100 – – – * 100 100 100

Segregation of total waste

982

1,746

851

1,662

218

1,778

189

1,596

227

1,444

161

1,829

169

1,7352,000

1,500

1,000

500

02009/102008/09 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Was

te v

olu

me

(to

nn

es)

Waste sent to landfill from main offices

Waste recycled from main offices

BP – Data Sheet – Environment – Waste

1. Main offices include: Osterley, Chilworth, Fairoak, and Scotland.

* New target set in November 2012; trend reported for information.



16Sky plc

Water use Our water consumption in 2014/15 increased slightly by 1m3 to 9m3 per full-time equivalent (FTE) employee. We

remain within the target range, our long-term trend showing that we are effectively managing our ongoing water

use, including supporting the streamlining of management processes as well as visibility over quarterly billing.

In terms of absolute water consumption however, we’ve seen a slight increase this year which ties into our

continued growth as a business. We realise water is becoming an increasingly precious commodity and remains

a vital natural resource. We continue to ensure we integrate water saving technologies into our new west

London campus development, installing low flush toilets and low flow taps/showers and collecting rainwater

wherever possible that we can use it on-site.

Target 2008/09 2009/10 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Water consumption (m3) n/a 105,146 124,224 137,560 111,776 150,666 141,239 191,255

Water consumption per FTE (m3) 9-11 8 8 9 6 8 7 9





01Sky plc

Suppliers | Responsible sourcing

Responsible sourcingThis year we repeated an inherent risk assessment against social, ethical

and environmental issues on all our suppliers with whom we spend more

than £100,000 per year in the UK and Ireland. Fully embedded within our

Procurement function, this is the first step in our risk-based approach to

responsible sourcing that helps us to identify suppliers with higher

inherent risk.

These high risk suppliers are then engaged our specialist third-party

provider, Supplier Ethical Data Exchange (Sedex). We request they

complete an independent self-assessment questionnaire (SAQ) on their

environmental and social management practices. We conduct audits

with suppliers and where challenges are highlighted, and work with them

to address these. Our Procurement teams use the findings from the

Sedex process, along with our audit findings, to identify if there are any

ethical, social or environmental issues in the supply chain. This approach

is made easier by this information and scoring being fully integrated into

Sky’s supplier management portal.

We have a clear set of objectives and standards that we communicate to

suppliers in the form of our online Responsible Sourcing policy. This is

referenced within the warrantee section of our T&Cs, forming an integral

part of the contractual process. We are continuing to increase the

transparency in our supply chain and understand risk and opportunity

across it. This year our focus is on integrating a group-wide approach to

include Sky in Germany and Austria, and Sky in Italy.

Responsible sourcing supplier assessment Target 2013/14 2014/15

Suppliers >£100,000 spend per year independently assessed against inherent risk criteria (%)

100 100 1001


SuppliersRESPONSIBLE BUSINESS

Highlights

Suppliers

100%of our suppliers that we spend >£100k/year

are independently assessed for inherent risk

02Sky plc

Suppliers | Responsible sourcing

Responsible sourcing continued

Responsible sourcing charter Commitments Progress 2014/15 Comments

Engage with suppliers via self-assessments

Completed We request all suppliers identified as high risk through the inherent risk process to complete an independent self-assessment questionnaire (SAQ) on their environmental and social management practices. This is conducted via third-party provider Sedex. The SAQ helps us to identify specific risks and where additional focus should be targeted, including audits. The supplier has to answer the SAQ to 95% or above to be as accurately scored as possible and be classed as complete. We set an internal minimum response rate of 65%, of which we have met and are satisfied with, but continue to encourage disclosure where appropriate.

Maintain a clear set of objectives and standards and communicate to suppliers

Completed The UK and Ireland Responsible Sourcing Policy is now referenced within the warrantee section of our T&Cs, forming an integral part of the contractual process. A specific training module on the use of this policy is provided to all new Procurement team members. This policy is publicly available at Sky.com/corporate

Maintain a clear and uniformed approach across all territories

Completed As part of the integration with Sky Deutschland and Sky Italia, we’ve conducted a gap analysis between the three new territories and are on track to implement a group-wide approach.

Embed our approach to responsible sourcing in line with International Guidelines

Completed Our approach covers the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (‘Ruggie framework’) at policy level as we demonstrate our commitment to respect and uphold human rights.

Independently audit high risk suppliers against ethical, environmental and social standards (SMETA – Sedex Members Ethical Trade Audit)

Completed This year we have performed 15 third-party independent audits across our key product manufacturing suppliers covering Labour standards; Health and Safety; Environment; and Business Practices. This equates to 16.5% of our high-risk suppliers from a supply risk or product procurement perspective. We followed the SMETA 4-pillar audit protocol and developed using the Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI) Base Code but adapted it to address the environment aspect separately via another more in-depth environment audit. All audits included site visits and face-to-face worker interviews in the respective language. These have been compiled into Corrective Action Plan Reports (CAPRs) and we are using our supplier management software portal to track these findings and check progress.

Integrate environmental and social criteria into purchasing process

Completed Our Procurement teams have a process to flag suppliers as high risk, before we partner with them. High risk suppliers that provide Customer Premised Equipment are independently audited against the SMETA protocol. The audit results feed into the scoring process at tender stage, forming part of the prequalification.

Set out targeted projects to address environment-related challenges highlighted in the CAPRs

On track CAPRs relating to the environment have been acted on. They are either closed or have an action plan in place to address. Specific projects have been implemented in some instances. For example, improvements have been made to wastewater systems to allow for reuse of water; installation of effective covers over waste storage areas; secondary containment has been installed where previously inadequate; and water meters have been installed to allow for more accurate measurement of water use on site. Environmental awareness training is also now being conducted across some suppliers. No supplier contracts have been terminated as a result of findings, as we choose to work with suppliers rather than moving to a new supplier.

Set out targeted projects to address labour-related challenges highlighted in the CAPRs.

On track CAPRs relating to labour challenges have been acted on; however we recognise that these types of findings are long-term or ongoing issues that will take a longer time to resolve. Consequently, we have supplier-led Action Plans in place that we review and track for progress. In relation to working hours specifically, suppliers are asked to provide periodic updates to show progress, which are tracked alongside scheduled re-audits. Safety conditions have been improved with emergency preparedness, first aid training and fire drills conducted; and emergency exit signs improved. No supplier contracts have been terminated as a result of the findings.

Assess use of conflict minerals in supply chain.

On track Minerals essential to electronic component manufacture are often found in areas of conflict, where they are often sold to perpetuate combat. These include tin, tantalum, tungsten and gold. U.S. legislation exists that requires companies to verify and disclose sources of conflict minerals. Although not required to by UK law, we have completed an assessment across key suppliers of our set-top boxes, routers and remotes for use of conflict minerals and are working with our suppliers to encourage them to be as transparent as possible. We realise this is an area we need to further develop our understanding. We are starting a project with WWF to investigate what our role would be to manage this difficult issue.



01Sky plc

Young people: Social reach | Young people taking part in initiatives across the Group | Employee participation

Young people taking part in initiatives across the GroupAcross Sky, we’ve chosen to focus on supporting young people. We

believe businesses need to step up and work alongside schools and

colleges to prepare young people for a successful future. Given the

power of our brand, it’s an area in which we believe we can make

a real difference. Our target is to create opportunities for up to one

million young people by 2020 through Sky Academy initiatives in the

UK and Ireland.

For the first time in 2014/15, we have collected data from our young

people initiatives in Germany and Italy for an overall social reach. This

is made up of 127,000 for Sky Academy in the UK and Ireland, 5,200

for Sky Foundation in Germany, and 7,900 for our initiatives in Italy.

Social reach: Young people taking part in initiatives across the Group*2013/14 2014/15

UK & Ireland: Sky Academy 105,000 127,0001

Germany & Austria: Sky Foundation – 5,200

Italy: TG24 for Schools – 7,900

TOTAL 140,100

* Figures rounded to the nearest hundred.


UK & Ireland: Sky AcademySky Academy in the UK and Ireland uses the power of TV, sport and

creativity to help young people build skills and experience. Since the

launch of Sky Academy in 2013, 231,000 young people have participated

in Sky Academy initiatives.

In our second year, we saw 127,000 young people take part in our Sky

Academy initiatives which keep us on track to reach one million young

people by 2020.

Young people: Social reach

INSPIRING ACTION

Highlights

We will help one million young people in the UK and Ireland to unlock their potential by 2020.

Social reach

140,100young people participated in

activities across the Group

02Sky plc

Young people taking part in initiatives across the Group continued

Germany & Austria: Sky FoundationSky Foundation in Germany focuses on inspiring children and young people to follow a more active and healthy

lifestyle, particularly those who are disabled or are from disadvantaged backgrounds. The Foundation funds a

number of projects delivered in partnership with charities and other business sponsors and we helped over

5,000 young people during the year.

Sky Foundation has helped to expand key projects across Germany, for example Buntkicktgut, a street football

league, which has expanded to Berlin and Dortmund over the past year.

Italy: Sky TG24 for SchoolsIn Italy, our Sky TG24 for Schools initiative allows secondary school students to see behind the scenes and

develop a critical analysis of the news by making their own TV news programme. Our Sky TG24 for Schools

programme in Italy expanded over the year from 22 classes in Rome to 316 classes across Italy. With 7,900

students taking part, each class produced a TV news report, learning about the media and working together

to build new skills.

Sky Academy participation1, 2

231,450

Nu

mb

er o

f yo

un

g p

eop

le(c

umul

ativ

e)

1,000,000

800,000

600,000

400,000

200,000

0

2013/14

2014/15

Target by 2020

1. We apply a de-duplication estimate of 4% from the total Academy participation each year.


Sky Academy has made new additions to the portfolio of initiatives this year. Sky Academy Careers Lab,

a full day careers experience for young people, launched in December 2014 and running three times a week,

has welcomed almost 2,500 young people to develop skills and get an insight into the world of work. At

the beginning of 2015 a second Sky Academy Skills Studios facility launched in Livingston, Scotland and

has already invited over 3,500 young people through the doors in only three months. Along with our facility

in Osterley, over 16,200 young people have participated across the UK this year.

Sky Sports Living for Sport continues to flourish across the UK, this year having a wider effect within the

schools, and continues to expand in the Republic of Ireland, reaching over 112,200 young people.

This year five new Sky Academy Art Scholarship recipients were announced at the South Bank Sky Arts

Awards show and one new Irish Sky Academy Sports Scholarship recipient joined the 11 existing scholars.

Over 1,000 opportunities were offered to young people starting out at Sky this year through our work

experience, apprenticeship and graduate opportunities.


03Sky plc


Employee participationSky employees in the UK and Ireland are all entitled to two days per year of paid volunteering time. We

encourage them to support our work with young people by volunteering to help young people build practical

skills. During the year, we surpassed our target of 10% of our people volunteering, reaching 13% and increasing

total volunteer numbers by 43% year on year.

We achieved this as a result of developing and expanding our approach, and providing more opportunities for

our staff to support our strategic initiatives that make up Sky Academy. Volunteers have worked with young

leaders and primary school students at Sky Sports Living for Sport Live events, assisted schools taking part

in Sky Academy Skills Studios in the UK, as well as the recently opened Livingston facility, and have also

supported in the delivery of Sky Academy Careers Lab which launched in December 2014.

Sky employees volunteering1, 2

9 10

1315

10

5

02013/142012/13 2014/15

Peo

ple

vo

lunt

eeri

ng

(%)

Target

1. Target based on 10% of total FTE at beginning of the financial year.

2. Data reflects the number of Sky people volunteering per full year in initiatives that support Sky Academy.



01Sky plc

Young people: Social impact | Positive social impact of Sky Academy on young people in the UK and Ireland | Our results

Positive social impact of Sky Academy on young people in the UK and IrelandAs well as tracking the number of individuals who take part, we also

commission research into how Sky Academy unlocks potential and impacts

young people’s lives.

Overall, our research shows that Sky Academy provides inspiring and

unique opportunities for young people. These experiences both boost skills

and help improve understanding of their importance. Young people gain

the confidence to apply these skills and develop them further in other

contexts, helping them to unlock their potential.

“One boy comes to mind who other PE teachers would say went under the

radar. Now he’s one of the best students. He progressed all the way up to

Advanced Higher this year.” Teacher, on Sky Sports Living for Sports

“It’s really helped me gain confidence in what I do, before I was a really shy person.” Sky Sports Living for Sports Student

“I’m more organised when I plan my school work now. When we were running a task we had to finish it before a

certain time, otherwise the tournament couldn’t continue.” Sky Sports Living for Sports Student

“Sky shouldn’t underestimate how much support they give just by opening their doors and inviting young people in

and talking to them and showing them around. It’s invaluable.” Teacher, on Sky Academy Careers Lab

“Sky has shown me hundreds of career options and inspired me to reach further for my future.” Sky Academy Careers Lab Student

“The children put on a mini event for their parents. Their parents came in and watched it. It was also played in the

whole school assembly on the following Friday from the event. We did a lot of talking in the classroom about the

skills they’d developed.” Teacher, on Sky Academy Skills Studios

“I thought there was going to be a big stress ball inside me and I’d be screaming in the corner but I wasn’t as panicky

and frustrated as I thought.” Sky Academy Skills Studios Student

“When we watched it over, we had a laugh at it at first. Then we were really happy with what we achieved because we

didn’t know we would be able to do that.” Sky Academy Skills Studios Student

Young people: Social impact

INSPIRING ACTION

Highlights

We focus our attention on six skills that help young people succeed: teamwork, creativity, communication, planning, resilience, and confidence.

Social impact

81%of students who participated in Sky Academy

Skills Studio rated themselves higher in at least one key skill

02Sky plc

Positive social impact of Sky Academy on young people in the UK and Ireland continued

Our research approachThe five initiatives that make up Sky Academy have been developed in partnership with education advisors so

they support young people in building skills to help them succeed. Research shows that skills like planning,

communication, resilience, teamwork, creativity and confidence help young people achieve more at school and

improve their chances of success in life (Framework of outcomes for young people. The Young Foundation. July

2012). These same skills that are often cited by employers as lacking when young people start work (CBI/

Pearson education and skills survey 2014).

Our methodsFor the last five years, we’ve been working with an independent research company, specialising in skills and

education, to measure the impact of our initiatives. We started this research in 2012 measuring our longest

standing initiative Sky Sports Living for Sport, beginning with a smaller set of skills and asking teacher to

report on changes they observed in their students after taking part (see Table 3 below).

We’ve now improved our approach, speaking to participants as well as teachers. We focus on the six core

cluster areas of planning, communication, resilience, teamwork, creativity and confidence. We are also

implementing a consistent approach across our long-standing and newer initiatives and over the coming year,

will be able to show our short and longer term impacts.

Our resultsWhat the students say about the impact of Sky Academy initiativesThe majority of young people who have taken part in Sky Academy initiatives report a positive impact

immediately after they have taken part.

Table 1 below shows the impact of Sky Academy on students’ individual skills for Sky Sports Living for Sport,

Academy Skills Studios and Sky Academy Careers Lab for 2014/15. We also have the results for 2013/14 for Sky

Academy Skills Studios.

Skills levels are derived from the pre- and post-experience survey of young people taking part. The percentage

of students who rate themselves higher in at least one of the skills we measure is then reported.


03Sky plc

Our results continued

Table 1: Sky Academy: students who report an improvement in skills1 (%)Skills 2013/142 2014/15*

Sky Sports Living for Sport 64

Sky Academy Skills Studios 66 81

Sky Academy Careers Lab 70

* Independently assured by Deloitte LLP.

1. See Basis of Reporting for the skills measured for each initiative

2. Our new approach was implemented for Sky Academy Skills Studios in 2013/14

Table 2 below shows the impact of Sky Academy on students’ confidence in applying their skills four to six

months after taking part in Sky Sports Living for Sport, Academy Skills Studios or Sky Academy Careers Lab

for 2014/15.

The results start to show the impact Sky Academy is having over the longer term. We focus on understanding

more about young people‘s confidence in using the skills we monitor and how this helps them develop these

skills further.

Greater confidence in skills application is derived from a survey four to six months after participation. The

percentage of students who consider themselves more confident applying at least one of the skills we

measure is then reported.

Table 2: Sky Academy: students who report improved confidence in applying their skills (%)Confidence in their skills 2014/151

Sky Sports Living for Sport 88

Sky Academy Skills Studios 90

Sky Academy Careers Lab 90

1. See Basis of Reporting for how increased confidence is using skills is measured for each initiative

What the teachers say about the impact of Sky Academy initiativesThe table below shows the impact of Sky Sports Living for Sport, our longest standing initiative, on each of the

skills we are measuring, as reported by teachers. It shows the percentage of teachers who noticed

improvements across each of the skills.

The findings show a consistent level of reporting from the teachers over three years, supporting the positive

impact Sky Sports Living for Sport is having on young people.

Table 3: Percentage of teachers reporting improvements in skills for Sky Sports Living for Sport1

Confidence in their skills 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15

Sky Sports Living for Sport

Confidence 92 91 88

Teamwork 91 92 90

Communication 91 89 89

Resilience – 81 86

Planning – – 79

Positive impact of Sky Academy on our people in the UK and IrelandWe regularly seek feedback from our staff, assessing their awareness of Sky Academy and asking how we

can improve it. In 2014, our survey showed almost everyone at Sky (96%) was aware of Sky Academy and

over 80% of people said they are proud to work for Sky when they know about Sky Academy.


04Sky plc


Our results continued

A key finding of the survey was that people wanted even more ways to get involved which we addressed by

asking for more people across the business to support a young person on work experience, placements

apprenticeship and our graduate schemes at Sky, and through providing new volunteering opportunities

through Sky Academy Careers Lab.

We encourage our employees to be part of Sky Academy through volunteering as their expertise provides

real-life inspiration to young people, whilst also developing skills for our people such as leadership,

collaboration and teamwork. Our independent research company measures the impact Sky Academy has on

Sky employees. As a result of taking part in Sky Sports Living for Sport, 77% said they had developed their

teamwork, confidence and communication skills and nine out of 10 said volunteering had a positive change in

their motivation.



01Sky plc

Cycling | Number of new people cycling regularly | Sky Ride participants

Number of new people cycling regularlyOur partnership with British Cycling, now in its seventh year, continues to

combine the inspiration of elite success with encouragement for more

people to ride year on year. The elite success of Team Sky has delivered

three British winners of the Tour de France and three overall victories for

Team Sky, further inspiring more people to ride.

Working alongside British Cycling and 64 local authority partners, we

open up the streets of major cities across the country, encouraging

people to ride around traffic-free streets with family and friends. This

Sky Ride programme continues to go from strength to strength,

expanding its reach across the country, inspiring more than 1.7 million

people to cycle regularly since 2009.

This year, we’ve also supported Sir Bradley Wiggins to set up his new

team, WIGGINS. The team gives up-and-coming British cyclists the

opportunity to ride with a professional team and for their talent to be

nurtured. The creation of WIGGINS and continued progress at a grass-

roots level means cycling continued to maintain its high profile within

the UK and Ireland in 2014.

New people cycling regularly1, 2, 3

1,704,0002,000,000

1,500,000

1,000,000

500,000

0

Nu

mb

er o

f peo

ple

(cu

mu

lati

ve)

2012/134

2013/14

2014/152014 Target

1. Year-on-year cumulative figure towards the (initial) target of one million, announced in 2009.

2. Results are from November to October of the reporting year.

3. The number of people cycling is the total number of people who have become regular cyclists where Sky has been an influencing factor. A regular cyclist is defined as someone who rides once a month or at least 12 times per year.

4. Cumulative figure since 2009.

CyclingINSPIRING ACTION

Highlights

We have now had over a million people at Sky Ride and Sky Ride Local events since our partnership with British Cycling started.

Cycling

1.7mmore people cycling regularly since 2009

02Sky plc

Cycling | Number of new people cycling regularly | Sky Ride participants

Sky Ride participantsWe want to encourage as many people as possible to start, and continue, cycling. In the sixth year of our

partnership with British Cycling our strategy was to expand the geographical spread of Sky Ride activities

throughout Britain and create innovative new ways for people to find other cyclists to go out and ride with.

Sky hosted 14 Sky Ride city events with over 107,000 participants in 2014. Sixty-four local authority partners

have now joined the Sky Ride programme and there were 2,087 Sky Ride Local rides with over 23,000

participants. Our Social Cycling Groups initiative continues to grow with over 27,000 participants.

Since 2013, our focus has been on increasing the range of activities people can get involved in across the

whole country. Our Sky Ride events programme continues to focus on increasing the number of regional

events in smaller locations. Whilst this has meant the number of people taking part in our events has

reduced from 2012, an uplift in awareness around Team Sky and our wider partnership with British

Cycling has enabled us to inspire more people to cycle regularly, which can be seen from the performance

figures reported.

Number of people participating in Sky Ride activities2012 2013 2014

People participating in Sky Ride activities (no.)1 173,767 149,3512 157,731

1. Per calendar year.

2. This figure has been updated from 123,289 to include Social Cycling Group participants.



01Sky plc

Sky Rainforest Rescue

In 2009, we set a three-year fundraising target of £2 million which was

achieved early in April 2012 through public and staff donations. These

were matched pound for pound by Sky, bringing the total to £4 million.

In July 2012, we extended our partnership with WWF and set a new target

to raise a further £2 million by July 2015. This was again achieved early

in March 2014 and was matched pound for pound by Sky to a further

£4 million. At year end 2014/15, over £5.2 million had been fundraised,

and £4 million matched, bringing the total to £9.3 million.

Over the past six years we have achieved all that we set out to do in Acre,

a state in north west Brazil. A billion trees are still standing, saving over

3.7 million tonnes of carbon emissions and thousands of people are

earning a living in a sustainable way without having to cut down trees.

In the UK and Ireland, 7.3 million people have a greater awareness of

deforestation as a result of our innovative communications, on-screen programming, and experiential

activities. Over the next three years, we will be working strategically with WWF to continue to raise awareness

of environmental issues.


2. Sky matched this figure pound for pound to £4 million.

3. The final total fundraised will be restated after the Sky Rainforest Rescue partnership comes to an end in September 2015.




INSPIRING ACTION

Highlights

We have achieved all that we set out to do. Thousands of people are living in a sustainable way without having to cut down trees, saving >3.7 million tonnes of carbon emissions.


1bn trees

are still standing in Acre, north west Brazil

5,275,9636,000,000

4,000,000

5,000,000

3,000,000

2,000,000

1,000,000

0

Fun

ds

rais

ed (£

m)

2012/131

2013/141

2014/151, 2, 3

2012 Target

2015 Target

BP – Data Sheet – Rainforest – Funds raisedPublic donations to Sky Rainforest Rescue (Cumulative since 2009)1

Documents

Financial Financial revenue and profit Financial POSITIVE …s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/skygroup-sky-static/documents... · 2017-05-15 · 2. Our adjusted free cash flow is defined