British broadcast station ITN has criticized plans by the BBC to run a free year-long trial of its mobile TV service, arguing the trials by a publicly funded company – which the BBC is – distort the market and place other providers at a competitive disadvantage. The Sunday Times reports that ITN has raised the matter in a letter to the BBC Trust, the body governing the BBC.

In March the BBC Trust gave the BBC the green light for the trial, which will include programming from BBC1, BBC News 24 and BBC3, along with up to eight radio stations. The BBC is initially working with Orange, Vodafone and 3. ITN also produces TV news content for the country’s mobile operators, including T-Mobile, which will launch the service this month. The BBC said it could not respond to ITN’s objections before seeing the letter. The BBC Trust declined to comment. The article points out that the BBC’s public funding is a “constant source of complaint for commercial media companies.” Last month the BBC was forced to abandon its online education service, because of complaints by other privately funded companies to the European Commission.
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—Orange UK Taps ITN For Video News