moving to replace Southern Television and various other wild ideas. In the end, the changes made to the ITV regions were as follows: The weekend franchises in the North of England and the Midlands were abolished. The North of England region was split into two new smaller regions, the North West and Yorkshire. Seven-day contracts were specified in both these new regions, as well as in the Midlands. Separate weekday and weekend franchises continued in London; however, the handover time was moved from the beginning of Saturday to Friday at 7.00pm. The ITV companies themselves changed considerably. Some merely had their contracts changed, while others were replaced altogether by new companies. The changes were as follows: TWW controversially lost the Wales and West of England franchise to a new company, Harlech Television (later shortened to HTV on 4 April 1970). Unhappy with the development, TWW ceased broadcasting on 4 March 1968 – nearly five months before its contract was due to expire – with the ITA providing an interim service until Harlech Television took over on 20 May. ATV lost the London weekend franchise to a consortium led by David Frost, called the London Television Consortium, which was soon renamed London Weekend Television. It had been expected that ABC would take over this franchise. ATV was awarded the seven-day contract for the Midlands region, replacing ABC at the weekends. Granada Television was awarded the seven-day contract for the new North West region, again replacing ABC at the weekends. Two consortia applied for the new Yorkshire region, Telefusion Yorkshire and Yorkshire Independent Television. The region was awarded to Telefusion, on the basis that it merged with Yorkshire Independent. The merged company took the name Yorkshire Television, replacing Granada on weekdays and ABC at the weekends. Rediffusion and ABC were asked to form a joint company for the London weekday franchise, in an attempt by the ITA to keep ABC in the network. This company, Thames Television, was controlled by ABC, who owned 51% while Rediffusion owned 49%. Roy Thomson, later Baron Thomson of Fleet, was required to divest himself of most of his holding in Scottish Television. These changes resulted in the "Big Four" of Rediffusion, ATV, ABC and Granada, who had produced most of the network output, being replaced by a new "Big Five" of Thames, LWT, ATV, Granada and Yorkshire. In addition, the Independent Television Publications company was formed