Whiskers - it seems I can't reply to you, but according to the top-rated comment on this page:
The majority of the operation is a taxpayer-funded public broadcaster with a remit to produce high quality programming for free; but there's a unit called BBC Worldwide whose job it is to battle it out in the red-in-tooth-and-claw world of commercial TV programming, selling BBC programmes overseas and minting money that can then be used to subsidize the public broadcasting component.
That would imply that BBC Worldwide profits do impact the license fee (assuming the BBC don't just spend the profits, but use it to drive down license fee costs).
