Lorraine Burgess, the former MD of Idris Elba's Green Door Pictures, has been named Chief Financial Officer at BBC Studios.

Burgess, who has been in the post on an interim basis since July, will take over permanently from Tom Fussell, who took over as CEO of BBC Studios at the end of last year.

Burgess will be a member of the BBC's Executive Committee and will be in charge of the commercial arm's overall financial strategy and teams.

Fussell said Burgess’ “extensive commercial, strategic and leadership experience in creative businesses have been invaluable over the last few months and will be critical as we seek to develop our ambitious growth plans and help deliver increasing commercial revenues for the BBC.”

Burgess served as Group MD of Idris Elba's Green Door Pictures for three and a half years, during which time the company produced projects such as Sky comedy In The Long Run and Sky Atlantic/Guerilla, Showtime's as well as non-scripted shows including Discovery's Idris Elba: No Limits.

She worked for J P Morgan and Universal Pictures before joining Endemol Shine Group (now Banijay) as Global Head of Digital Operations.

Burgess' job is becoming more and more essential.

With the BBC's licence fee set to remain fixed for the next two years, Director General Tim Davie is putting pressure on the commercial arm he used to run to return more money to the BBC's coffers. Over the next five years, the producer-distributor is expected to increase returns by 30%.