ITV yanks 'Tycoon' from prime slot

ITV has dropped Tycoon from its Tuesday, 9pm slot after a second successive week of disastrous ratings.

The business-based reality show - fronted and produced by Peter Jones - debuted last week to 2 million viewers but lost 100,000 on its latest outing last night. The figures are significantly down on ITV1's year-to-date slot average of 4.5 million.

The series will return on Monday, July 9 as a 30-minute format for the 10pm slot. An unconfirmed 90-minute drama will now air next Tuesday, July 3.

"Tycoon has been moved into a new slot," confirmed a spokeswoman. "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 replaces the reality-chat hybrid 24 Hours With..., which will now play out "in the future", the spokeswoman added.

The Tuesday night revamp also marks the end for struggling comedy Tough Gig after an audience of just 838,000 tuned in for the latest episode.