Media: business succession in the UK

Name: Media business succession in the UK
Creator: ExitRadar
License: https://www.exitradar.co.uk/terms

21,922 UK media companies — 28.9% — have a director aged 60 or over.

3.6 points below the all-trades average of 32.5%.

Companies measured75,932

Director aged 60+21,922

Exposure rate28.9%

Companies House register·Measured base 3,475,770·Data as at 13 August 2026·Full methodology

75,932

Companies measured

21,922

With a director 60+

7,814

With a director 70+

28.9%

Exposure rate

Of the 21,922 with a director over 60, 799 score 50 or higher on business quality — an output of our own scoring model, not a Companies House figure. How we score it.

Media by region

Region	Companies	60+	Rate
South West	5,263	1,805	34.3%
Scotland	2,757	894	32.4%
Wales	2,052	661	32.2%
South East	11,415	3,602	31.6%
West Midlands	3,303	935	28.3%
East of England	5,628	1,574	28%
London	33,264	9,313	28%
North East	1,034	289	27.9%
Yorkshire & The Humber	3,046	811	26.6%
East Midlands	2,231	577	25.9%
Northern Ireland	978	244	24.9%
North West	4,920	1,206	24.5%

Combinations with fewer than 250 measured companies are not listed separately. They are still counted in every total on this page.

Part of the UK Business Succession Index.

Cite this page

These figures are free to quote and reproduce, including in commercial work, with attribution to ExitRadar and a link to this page.

ExitRadar, "Media: business succession in the UK", UK Business Succession Index, 13 August 2026. https://www.exitradar.co.uk/succession/svc-media/

Need a cut that is not published here — a different trade grouping, a finer geography, or the underlying distribution? Get in touch and we will usually provide it. Methodology.

Method. Figures cover the 3,475,770 active UK companies where Companies House records an age bracket for at least one serving director — 93.8% of the 3,706,712 companies on the active register. A company counts as succession-exposed when its oldest serving director is 60 or over — not the board average, which would hide a 70-year-old founder sitting alongside younger co-directors. The business-quality figure covers only the subset our model assesses — see the methodology for why that is far smaller than the number with filed accounts. Data as at 13 August 2026; updated quarterly, next update October 2026. Full methodology.