Spotlight on digital innovation as Media Cymru partner with BBC Cymru Wales to fund R&D

Media Cymru has invested £80,000 across five Welsh companies to research and develop innovative digital content for YouTube audiences, in partnership with BBC Cymru Wales.

The Wales-based production companies – each awarded £16,000 – will creatively reimagine existing content for the online platform, thinking about how their returning series for BBC Cymru Wales can be changed or revamped, to expand the reach of a well-loved brand while building a bridge back to BBC iPlayer.

The fund, which targets digital innovation, is the first of its kind for BBC Cymru Wales. It follows the news about BBC’s recent YouTube partnership, announced last month.

Digital Innovation Fund companies include: Beastly Media, Cadno, Cwmni Da, Darlun Cyf. and One Tribe TV.

Beastly Media’s project will focus on their award-winning comedy The Golden Cobra and Cadno will work with Iolo Williams and his crew to reveal the real wild side of filming nature. Cwmni Da will develop videos using AI tools to target a digital-first, bilingual, YouTube audience whilst Darlun Cyf. will explore immersive storytelling for SOS: Extreme Rescues. One Tribe TV’s project aims to connect a digital native audience to platforms more familiar with traditional linear TV.

Sara Pepper, Co-Director at Media Cymru, said: “Our previous partnerships with BBC Cymru Wales, through the Content Innovation Fund in 2023 and the Climate Content Fund in 2025, have sparked a strong pipeline of new ideas, approaches and engagement with emerging technologies. As our collaboration continues to grow, we’re really pleased to be working together once again on this new fund focused on digital innovation.

“As the sector increasingly shifts towards digital-first content, Media Cymru has been supporting experimentation and innovation in this space through a range of new funds. I’m genuinely excited to see how these five indies use R&D to reimagine and refresh their existing content for digital audiences and to learn alongside them as this work develops.”

Nick Andrews, Head of Commissioning for BBC Cymru Wales, said: “The new strategic partnership with YouTube is part of the BBC’s value for all strategy, ensuring more BBC content is accessible to all audiences wherever they are, delivering more for audiences and supporting Creators across the whole of the UK. This new fund, in partnership with Media Cymru, will help enable us to deliver this strategy, developing key BBC Cymru Wales programme brands for those hard-to-reach audiences and bringing more people to the BBC.”

Awarded companies attended an Insight Day at BBC Central Square in Cardiff this week (9 February 2026), where they presented their ideas and participated in talks from BBC’s Audience Research team about data driven insight on maximising the benefits of YouTube, as well as discussing how to engage diverse audiences via digital platforms.

R&D projects will take place between February and April 2026.