page_title: Sveriges Television
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Sveriges Television / History
caption_attribution_description: Sveriges Television, byggnad i Stockholm
context_page_description: Sveriges Television AB, Sweden's Television, is the Swedish national public television broadcaster, funded by a public service tax on personal income set by the Riksdag. Prior to 2019, SVT was funded by a television licence fee payable by all owners of television sets. The Swedish public broadcasting system is largely modeled after the system used in the United Kingdom, and Sveriges Television shares many traits with its British counterpart, the BBC.
  SVT is a public limited company that can be described as a quasi-autonomous non-government organisation. Together with the other two public broadcasters, Sveriges Radio and Sveriges Utbildningsradio, it is owned by an independent foundation, Förvaltningsstiftelsen för Sveriges Radio AB, Sveriges Television AB och Sveriges Utbildningsradio AB. The foundation's board consists of 13 politicians, representing the political parties in the Riksdag and appointed by the Government. The foundation in turn appoints the members of the SVT board. SVT's regulatory framework is governed by Swedish law.
context_section_description: When radio broadcasting was first organized in the 1920s, it was decided to adopt a model similar to that of the British Broadcasting Company in the United Kingdom. Radio would be a monopoly funded by a licence fee and organized as a limited company, AB Radiotjänst ("Radio Service Ltd."), owned by the radio industry and the press. The transmitters were owned by the state through Telegrafverket and the press held a monopoly on newscasts through Tidningarnas Telegrambyrå. AB Radiotjänst was one of 23 founding broadcasting organizations of the European Broadcasting Union in 1950.
  Tidningarnas Telegrambyrå lost its monopoly on newscasts de jure in 1947 and de facto in 1956, but otherwise the same model would be applied to television.
  It was decided to start test transmissions of television in June 1954. The first transmissions were made on 29 October 1954 from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm.
  In 1956 the Riksdag decided that television broadcasting should continue on a permanent basis and on 4 September Radiotjänst initiated official transmissions from the new Nacka transmitter. A television licence for those owning a television set was introduced in October of that year.
  Regularly scheduled television programming began in 1957. At the same time, Radiotjänst was renamed Sveriges Radio (SR) and its ownership was changed. The state and the press would have equal 40% shares, while the company itself would own 20% (in 1967, the state increased its share to 60% at the expense of the press).
  In 1958, the first newscast, Aktuellt, was broadcast. During the 1960s the establishment of a second TV channel was frequently discussed. These discussions resulted in the launch of TV2 on 5 December 1969. The original channel became TV1 and it was intended that the two channels would broadcast in "stimulating competition" within the same company.
  The first stage of the main headquarters building and TV studios for Sveriges Television, called TV-huset (sv), was inaugurated on Oxenstiernsgatan in the Östermalm district in Stockholm on 30 October 1967. The completion of the second stage of TV-huset and its official opening was on 5 December 1969, the same day as the start of operations of TV2, making it one the largest television studios in Europe at that time.
  1970 saw the start of the first regional programme, Sydnytt from Malmö. More regional news programmes launched in 1972 and the entire country was covered by regional news programmes by 1987 when ABC from Stockholm began.
  When TV2 started the news programmes were reorganized. Aktuellt was replaced by TV-nytt, which was responsible for the main 19.30 bulletin on TV1 as well as news updates on both channels. In addition, the two channels would get one "commentary bulletin" each. TV2's was entitled Rapport and TV1's was Nu.
  In 1972, the news was reorganized once again. Rapport was moved to the 19.30 slot on TV2 while Aktuellt was revived, to broadcast at 18.00 and 21.00 on TV1. These timeslots would mostly stay unchanged for the following decades.
  In 1966, the first colour broadcast was made, with regular colour broadcasts being introduced in 1970. Teletext started in 1978.
  At the end of the 1970s, SR was reorganized. From 1 July 1979, Sveriges Radio AB became the mother of four companies: Sveriges Riksradio (RR) for national radio, Sveriges Lokalradio AB (LRAB) for local radio, Sveriges Utbildningsradio (UR) for educational broadcasting and Sveriges Television (SVT) for television. SVT would provide all television broadcasting, except for educational programming which was the responsibility of Sveriges Utbildningsradio. The abbreviation SVT was chosen over the arguably more logical "STV" as that abbreviation was already occupied by Scottish Television in the EBU. The Swedish EBU membership is currently jointly held by SVT, SR and UR.
  The two channels were reorganized in 1987. TV1 was renamed Kanal 1 and contained almost all programmes produced in Stockholm, while TV2 consisted of the ten regional districts and the Rapport news desk.
  Broadcasting in Nicam Stereo was made perman
caption: SVT headquarters in Stockholm
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