Media In The City

Each week, MediaTel INSIGHT brings NewsLine readers a round-up of the latest news from the City affecting the media industry.This week saw Emap chief executive Tom Maloney quit the group with immediate effect, leading some to speculate that the company could soon be subject to a bid approach (Full Story).

ITV also came under the spotlight as rumours emerged that Jim Hytner, former ITV commercial and marketing director, could return to the corporation (Full Story) and could be joined there by Dawn Airey following her departure from Iostar (Full Story).

On firmer ground, ITV announced that advertising revenue for ITV1 will be down by 9.6% for the first half of 2007, whilst ITV Plc’s total advertising revenue is down by 7.5% (Full Story).

Sticking with television, Endemol was bought by a consortium consisting of co-founder John de Mol and ex-Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, for £1.8 billion (Full Story).

Coming hot on the heels of Google’s acquisition of DoubleClick (see Ovum Analyst Discusses The Future Of Google), both WPP and Microsoft bagged themselves digital marketing companies.

WPP pounced on 24/7 Real Media, snapping it up for a cool £329 million (Full Story), whilst Microsoft grabbed aQuantive in a deal worth £3.04 billion (Full Story).

Meanwhile, Reuters agreed a merger with Canadian news group Thomson, with Thomson paying approximately £8.7 billion for the privilege (Full Story).

Finally, Chrysalis announced a 9.1% decline in radio revenues for the six months from September to February 2007 (Full Story).

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