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Channel 4’s content chief, Ian Katz, who holds responsibility for the broadcaster’s £650m annual programming budget and output, is to leave after almost nine years in the post.

Katz, a former senior executive at the Guardian, became the channel’s director of programmes in January 2018 after moving from the BBC where he was editor of Newsnight.

He was made chief content officer in January 2021 and will depart the post in October, making him Channel 4’s longest-serving head of programming.

Katz is the latest high-profile executive to depart Channel 4 after the appointment of the new chief executive, Priya Dogra, from Sky. In February, Jonathan Allan, who held the role of interim chief executive after the departure of Alex Mahon, announced his resignation after 15 years at Channel 4.

Katz – who was paid £720,000, including a £238,000 bonus, according to Channel 4’s latest accounts for 2024 – was a key member of the team that helped fend the previous Conservative government’s campaign to privatise the broadcaster, which was finally abandoned three years ago.

“It’s been a privilege beyond words to lead Channel 4’s talented and passionate commissioning team through such a transformative period,” he said.

“I’m incredibly proud of what we’ve achieved, from pioneering the evolution of a commercial public service broadcaster into a digital streaming business, to backing groundbreaking programmes and talent that have brought a bit of joy to audience’s lives.”

The departure of Katz leaves something of a management vacuum at the top of Channel 4, with two of the three most senior executive positions now effectively vacant, but opens up an opportunity for one of the most influential positions in British broadcasting.

“Ian has been an outstanding creative leader for Channel 4 over nearly nine years – the channel’s longest-serving head of programming,” said Dogra, who took up the chief executive post last month. “He has overseen an era of creative renewal, delivering bold and distinctive public service programming with intellectual rigour, good humour and an unmistakably Channel 4 glint in the eye.”

During his time in post Katz has delivered hits including the comedies Derry Girls and Big Boys, the dramas It’s A Sin and Dirty Business and the music competition The Piano, as well as the panel game Taskmaster, acquired after a successful run on rival channel Dave.

However, critics have said that the broadcaster still relies heavily on stalwarts commissioned before Katz’s arrival, including Gogglebox, Grand Designs and Great British Bake Off, which was poached by his predecessor Jay Hunt from the BBC and recently refreshed by Katz luring Nigella Lawson to be a judge to replace Prue Leith.

Attempts to engineer another big returnable ratings winner have not borne fruit, with the reality TV shows The Circle and Rise and Fall failing to resonate with viewers.

In 2023, Katz was the only top executive to decline his performance bonus, a year that included Channel 4 reporting the steepest decline in revenues in its 43-year history, a £50m cut to the content budget that hit the independent TV production community, and the biggest round of staff layoffs in 15 years.

At the time Mahon said it was an important decision for Katz, who deals with hundreds of production companies a year, “because he feels close to the indie community”.

On Thursday, Katz addressed the independent production community saying that running Channel 4’s programming team “might well be the best job in the world” and a “tough one to leave”.

“The channel faces numerous challenges but, in a world of consolidation, risk-averse decision making and increasingly homogenised programming, the need for an independent, irreverent, iconoclastic, Channel 4 is greater than ever,” he said. “We’ve done it working with indies across the country, helping to break London’s decades-long chokehold on our industry.”

Katz, a former deputy editor of the Guardian, joined Newsnight in 2013 with the programme in crisis after it scrapped an investigation into Jimmy Savile’s sex crimes and then ran a separate piece that led to Lord McAlpine wrongly being accused of child abuse.