Dragon's Den star's show Tycoon axed from primetime slot

11 April 2012
The Weekender

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Dragon's Den star Peter Jones's new TV show has been axed from its peak-time slot. ITV has decided to move Tycoon following terrible ratings.

The show was produced by Jones's specially created production company Peter Jones TV.

The multi-millionaire, 41, has invested £160,000 in the ITV1 business reality programme.

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Peter Jones's new TV show has been axed from its peak-time slot

Some critics dubbed Jones's peak-time TV offering Dragons' Den meets The Apprentice, and Jones as "Sir Alan Sugar Lite".

As well as shunting the show to the 10pm slot, ITV has also decided to reduce each one-hour episode to just half an hour.

The 9pm slot that has been home to Tycoon will initially be replaced with a one-hour drama, yet to be decided.

TV bosses had waited to see what happened with the second episode before making any rescheduling decisions.

Its debut was watched by two million viewers, while the second instalment last night attracted even fewer - 1.9 million.

Britain's Got Talent was seen by 6.8 million when it ran at the same time on ITV1 earlier this month.

An ITV spokesman confirmed: "Tycoon has been moved into a new slot.

"ITV1 has performed very strongly so far in 2007, with some of our best results for three years, and we have taken a commercial decision to protect that performance.

"Happily we have been able to return the series to a new slot."

Tycoon sees Jones, whose business portfolio is worth an estimated £200 million, invest time and money in six businesses.

On its first week, the show helped ITV1 get its worst all-hours performance for a Tuesday so far this year and its third-worst peak time performance of 2007.

But Jones has said in the past: "I don't believe in failure. I see it as feedback."

ITV boss Michael Grade recently said the broadcaster would stop copycat programming, branding it "creatively bankrupt".

Tycoon will return on Monday July 9, also moving from a Tuesday to a Monday.

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