US publishing giant, Gannett, has written to the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to seek permission to make formal takeover bid for UK regional newspaper publisher, Newscom. Gannett has decided to find out whether a Competition Commission investigation would prevent such a takeover before placing a formal offer with the Stock Exchange.Earlier in the… Continue reading Gannett Seeks Permission To Bid For Newscom
Satellite broadcaster BSkyB has acquired a 10% stake in UK computer games portal and community, gameplay.com. As part of the deal, Sky and gameplay have entered into a strategic alliance through which Gameplay will become BSkyB’s computer and video games ecommerce partner across Sky’s online interests, including www.sky.co.uk. The partnership includes Gameplay committing to a… Continue reading BSkyB Buys Into Gaming Portal
Cable company NTL has this morning announced a major carriage contract with pay-TV programme supplier Flextech. The deal gives NTL access to all of Flextech’s channels, including the UKTV portfolio of stations produced in partnership with the BBC. There will also be a joint marketing initiative set up to promote the channels and particularly their… Continue reading NTL Signs Major Carriage Deal With Flextech
Reed International moved to the top of the FTSE yesterday after the publisher laid down its internet strategy. Share prices in the group, which plans to invest between £150-200 million on its net plans, rose 59žp to 443p, despite a profits warning.BSkyB jumped 63p to a record 938˝p after the broadcaster bought a 10% stake… Continue reading Sharewatch
The UK’s only weekly sports-dedicated newspaper, Sport First, has created two new partnerships to aid its circulation and distribution.In the first, Sport First has developed a tie-in with the Big Issue that will see Big Issue homeless street vendors selling the sports paper around the London ITV region. If this trial proves successful, the scheme… Continue reading Sport First Creates New Distribution Partnerships
Takeover rumours and a broker’s recommendation helped shares in Cable & Wireless soar to close up 81p at 974˝p. Further rumours of a tie between Pearson and AOL pushed shares in the former to an all-time high of 1,781p, a rise of 143p.BSkyB surged up 62p yesterday on the possibility of a resumption of merger… Continue reading Sharewatch
The Informa Group has bought the Newsletters division of the Financial Times, adding 60 newsletters, 600 management reports and 24 directories to its portfolio. Informa will pay a total of £13.5 million to Financial Times Business (FTB) for the titles which were put up for sale in September.Informa emerged as one of the likely suitors… Continue reading Informa Acquires Financial Times Newsletters
EMAP has this morning announced plans to develop a new digital media initiative targeting the UK’s television production market. In a joint venture with Channel 5 and netdecisions, EMAP will launch produxion.com in January 2000.The website has been developed over the last six months to provide the UK’s television programming market – estimated to be… Continue reading EMAP To Launch Web Portal For UK TV Production Industry
EMAP is putting together plans to launch a TV channel based on its Kiss 100 FM radio station and Mixmag clubbing title. EMAP is hoping to launch the Kiss Mix channel next year although it is understood that carriage deals have not yet been finalised.EMAP already has some experience of operating a television channel through… Continue reading EMAP To Develop Kiss TV Channel
The growth in worldwide advertising expenditure is set to remain above 6% for the next three years, according to new forecasts published by global advertising group, Zenith Media. In 2000, growth is expected to accelerate to 6.5%, with levels in 2001 and 2002 holding above 6%.North America is set to be the fastest-growing region in… Continue reading Worldwide Adspend Growth To Stay Above 6%
