Channel 4 is launching the search for a location for its new national headquartersby outlining its plans to more than 100 representatives of UK cities and regions on Monday.

The broadcaster is to kick off the bidding process with a presentation at its Horseferry Road headquarters in London, led by its chief executive, Alex Mahon, and Jonathan Allan, its chief commercial officer who is running the process. The publicly owned broadcaster is also webcasting the event to invitees across the UK who cannot attend in person.

Channel 4 will distribute a 15-page brochure outlining what it is looking for and the timeline for submissions with final decisions on the “winning” locations due in the third quarter.

The initiative, called 4 All in the UK, will be the biggest structural change in the broadcaster’s 35-year history: it will open three new “creative hubs” in the nations and regions, with the largest to be a new national HQ that will have facilities including a TV studio and host executive and board meetings.

The plans include 300 of its 800 staff moving out of the capital – currently only 30 staff are based outside London, 25 sales people in Manchester and five employees in Glasgow. Channel 4 News will open three new news bureaux, with a trebling of news jobs in the nations and regions by 2020, while spend on shows made by TV production companies based outside London will rise from £169m annually to about £350m a year by 2023.

More than a dozen cities and regions across the UK – including Birmingham and Manchester, Brighton, Bristol, Nottingham, Sheffield and Hull – have expressed an interest in hosting a new Channel 4 headquarters and benefiting from the broadcaster’s largesse.

The lobbying has already been intense, with Andy Street, the John Lewis managing director turned west Midlands mayor, describing his region as the “frontrunner”.

Channel 4 will have to tread carefully to make sure any enticements and inducements offered by bidders to try to win the pitch process do not break state aid rules.

Government rules say that state aid is“any advantage granted by public authorities through state resources on a selective basis to any organisations that could potentially distort competition and trade in the European Union”.

“Like any company, Channel 4 will have regard to all relevant legal and regulatory obligation in this process,” said a spokeswoman for the broadcaster. “We have robust processes in place for all our third-party business arrangements, which will also apply as we progress the selection of our new locations.”

RUNNERS AND RIDERS
Birmingham
Birmingham was quickest out of the blocks with plans in place to offer two prime HQ locations, including a site near the city centre’s proposed high-speed rail station. The sites were in part identified by the local enterprise partnership, which at the time was chaired by Street.

The UK’s second largest city is already benefiting from the BBC boosting its presence. This year, BBC3 is moving half of its operation there, including responsibility for a third of its £30m budget. It is also the home of a new youth team for BBC News and the base for the corporation’s partnership with local newspapers.

Manchester
An early favourite, the city has gone very quiet on the lobbying front since former culture secretary Andy Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester, wrote directly to former culture secretary Karen Bradley as part of an “ambitious bid”. He said Greater Manchester was “the only viable alternative outside of London”.

MediaCity in Salford already hosts a BBC base of about 2,700 transplanted from London housing sport, CBeebies, Radio 5 Live, Breakfast and Learning, as well as programmes such as Mastermind and Dragons’ Den

ITV also has a significant operation, including 750 staff working on productions including Coronation Street. Sky has 32 employees of its Sky Media sales operation based in the city, as does Channel 4.

Leeds
Sky has a major technology centre in Leeds, called Sky@LeedsDock, employing 650 staff working on apps and websites primarily to enhance customer service. Online sports business Perform has about 100 staff based in the city. Leeds is also home to Sky-owned True North, one of the biggest regional TV production companies in the UK, which makes shows including A New Life in the Sun.

Bristol
Channel 4 would be in good media company in Bristol, which is home to the BBC’s Natural History Unit, Wallace & Gromit maker Aardman Animations and a raft of other production companies.