When Angelos Frangopoulos addressed his newly assembled staff in early May last year, the atmosphere was jubilant, giddy even: that curious cocktail of carefully curated rebellion that only a start-up can provide. In the Great Western ballroom of the Hilton hotel in Paddington, London, the chief executive of GB News – who is 56, trim and boasts the closely razored head of the power-bald – ran through what was by now a familiar sales pitch.
This 80-strong crowd were about to disrupt the staid world of TV news – a relatively niche industry, and one that had changed little since Sky News launched over three decades ago. They would be reaching an audience that TV had left behind, or just plain talked down to. GB News would be for viewers outside the London bubble; it would celebrate Brexit, not mourn it. It would debate subjects – vaccines, lockdowns, knee-taking for all reasons other than shoelaces and marriage proposals – that others treated as the new status quo. And it would do this in every format possible. GB News was not a broadcaster, Frangopoulos told staff: it was a tech company, a disruptor. The revolution would be televised, but it would also be on TikTok and DAB radio. At least, that is, once they’d built the studio to TikTok and DAB from.
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