MUMBAI: BBC director general Mark Thompson will step down from his post and leave the organisation either later this year after the Olympic Games or in 2013.

BBC Trust chairman Lord Patten had said earlier that the organisation had already employed headhunters Egon Zehnder to search for a successor to Thompson.

Reports state that there are three internal possibilities for the job. They are BBC COO Caroline Thomson, BBC News head Helen Boaden and BBC Vision head George Entwistle.

MUMBAI: BBC has exceeded its target of a 25 per cent reduction to the senior management pay bill and 20 per cent reduction in headcount.

This is part of the commitment the BBC Trust had made in October 2009 to accept the Executive?s recommendations for reducing the senior management pay bill by 25 per cent and headcount by 20 per cent by July 2013. These targets were subsequently brought forward to the end of 2011.

Figures released show that by 31 December 2011 the reductions achieved are as follows:

BBC director business operations Lucy Adams said, ?Keeping salary costs under control is hugely important to us. The reductions we have achieved in this area reflect our commitment to ensuring we are delivering value for money in difficult economic times. We will continue to keep a close eye on these costs reducing them still further where we can.?

The BBC chairman Lord Patten has since recommended a further reduction to senior management numbers to a total of 1 per cent of the total workforce by 2015 at the latest.