BSkyB and Quality, Value, Convenience (QVC) are to launch a 24 hour shopping channel to cover Europe on 1st October.QVC is the largest shopping service in the US, transmitted live, all day every day, to around 44m cable homes and 3m satellite homes. BSkyB believes the new channel will ‘add a new dimension’ to their… Continue reading BSkyB/QVC Home Shopping Link-Up
Portsmouth and Sunderland Newspapers has reported a 50% leap in profits to £6m, for the year to the end of March. The publisher’s titles inlcude the Portsmouth News and the Sunderland Star.
Granada Television has revealed profits of £21m for the 6-months to March 27, an increase of 19% on last year. The Granada Group as a whole recorded profits of £68.1m, up by 28% on 1992.
Thomson Directories has signed a deal to sponsor Sky News’ weather bulletins. Thomson already sponsors Channel 4’s weather bulletins.
The Saatchi & Saatchi £73m rights issue has had a 92% take-up. The money raised will be used in a variety of ways. £36.5m will go towards reducing bank debt, £19m will buy minority stakes in European advertising subsidiaries, £10.5m will be used to strengthen media buying and £7m will be used for new technology.
Following yesterday’s meeting between Peter Brooke, Heritage Secretary, and ITV companies opposition to take-overs amongst the 9 largest contractors would appear to be dwindling, with companies accounting for 70% of ITV advertising revenue now backing the move.The main supporters prior to yesterday were Carlton, LWT, Central and Granada. They have since been joined by YTV… Continue reading Opposition To Take-Over Deal Withers
In a meeting with BBC director general, John Birt, Richard Branson has proposed a radio frequency swap between Virgin and Radio 4 under which the BBC would get Virgin’s medium wave and Virgin would get the FM frequency.Both stations are suffering from problems with regard to frequencies – Virgin due to the poor quality sound… Continue reading Virgin Radio 4 Frequency Swap?
QualitiesThe latest 6-monthly ABCs for the quality newspapers show the Sunday Times recording the highest circulation increase. Its figure of 1,218,440 for December to May’93 was up 3.8% year-on- year.The Independent on Sunday’s monthly ABCs have shown a decline over recent months since reaching a peak of 401,000 in February. This indicates the newspaper’s circulation… Continue reading National Press Round-Up – May
According to a survey carried out by communication analysts, CIT Research, UK companies are at the forefront of the media industry’s push for recovery from the recession, although this has little to do with an improved economic climate.Comparing the financial performance of 150 media companies across Europe CIT found that most UK groups have by… Continue reading UK Lead Way To Media Industry Recovery
Steven Spielberg’s dinosaur horror movie – Jurassic Park – took the most money for any film in history over a non-holiday weekend in the US. The box office receipts for Saturday alone were £12m ($18m) which represented the largest amount ever grossed by a film in one day. The audience figure for the weekend was… Continue reading Dinosaurs Break Box Office Record
