BSkyB’s chief operating officer, Richard Freudenstein, is to leave the company next year to return to his home country, Australia, following the launch of Sky’s high definition (HD) TV service. Freudenstein joined Sky in 1999 as the company’s general manager, before being appointed chief operating officer the following year. The outgoing TV boss will continue… Continue reading Sky COO To Step Down In New Year

A new forecast from Informa Telecoms & Media claims SMS messages will remain a key revenue driver for the mobile industry in the next five years, despite growth in enhanced messaging services such as multimedia messaging (MMS), mobile email and instant messaging (IM). According to Informa, person to person (P2P) messaging will continue to represent… Continue reading SMS To Remain Revenue Driver Despite Advanced Rivals

New statistics from internet analysts Hitwise show UK shoppers leaving more of their festive shopping to the last minute this year, with internet usage figures revealing visits to sites in the Shopping & Classifieds category reaching a new peak of 14.85% of all internet visits last week. While Hitwise reports a week-on-week increase of less… Continue reading Online Shopping Sees Festive Rush Left To Last Minute

The second half of ITV’s psychological thriller, Secret Smile, drew an audience of 5.8 million last night, performing well, but failing to replicate the success of the first episode’s 6.9 million.The programme compared favourably with BBC One’s offering of Crimewatch UK and regional news in the same time slot, however, building on ITV’s success earlier… Continue reading Secret Smile Falters As ITV Trades Blows With BBC

Emap Advertising has announced a major re-organisation of its internal Radio Agency Sales Team, focusing on two main areas of radio sales and strategic accounts.The radio firm claims the restructure will deliver a “more efficient and customer-focused” service to its agency clients, as well as increasing the company’s overall radio advertising share.Under the new structure,… Continue reading Emap Restructures Radio Ad Division

Heart 106.2 has moved Sunday evening host Emma B to its drivetime show, pairing her with Greg Burns to co-host the show from 3 January. The move will see Emma B take to the air on the same day as London rival Capital FM relaunches.The new drivetime presenter joined Heart earlier this year, but will… Continue reading Heart Moves Emma B To Drivetime

The latest figures from internet research specialist Nielsen//NetRatings show online career and employment sites in bloom, as a quarter of all European internet users report using the internet to look at job websites between July-September.In the same period, 43% of Europe’s online population were seen visiting the websites of universities. Overall, 68 million internet users… Continue reading Online Round-Up: Job Seekers Make Career Move Online

London’s newest free morning newspaper, City AM, has secured distribution within all of the capital’s airports, significantly increasing its reach and further targeting the business community.The newspaper will now be available at Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted and City Airport, distributed through branded display units in over 50 business lounges serving major airlines including British Airways, Virgin,… Continue reading City AM Signs London Airports For Business Distribution

Media giant Aegis Group has announced the acquisition of Scandinavian market research network Univero for £10 million. The deal sees Aegis extend its reach across Norway, Sweden and Denmark, with Univero’s subsidiary firms MMI Univero, TEMO Univero, LUI Univero, Vilstrup Univero and Fieldwork Scandinavia now forming part of Aegis’ network. The research markets covered by… Continue reading Aegis Widens Reach With Scandinavian Research

ITV is to close its 24 hour rolling news channel at the end of January, threatening around 70 jobs, although the broadcaster has pledged to redeploy as many staff as possible, and work with unions on the scale of any required redundancies. The move, announced this morning alongside a £2 million investment in news programming… Continue reading ITV To Axe News Channel By End Of January