Media In The City: Microsoft Invests $240 million In Facebook

Last week in the City the big news was Microsoft’s $240 million (£117 million) investment in Facebook, putting a $15 billion value on the social networking website.

The companies also signed an advertising deal making Microsoft the site’s exclusive third-party advertising platform partner, and it will begin to sell advertising for Facebook internationally (Full Story).

In other news, Pearson, owner of the Financial Times and publisher Penguin, announced that for the first nine months of 2007, underlying sales were 6% higher and operating profits 20% higher than in the same period last year.

The group said that for the full year, it remains on course to achieve strong underlying growth on its key financial measures: earnings, cash generation and return on invested capital (Full Story).

Omnicom also released results, for the third quarter, revealing that its net profit increased 14.2% to $202.2 million, from $177.1 million in the third quarter of 2006.

The advertising holding company also announced that its worldwide revenue increased 11.8% to $3,101.4 million from $2,774.3 million in the third quarter of 2006 (Full Story).

Aegis Group announced the acquisition of Canadian independent media agency Genesis Media (Full Story).

Aegis said that the acquisition of Genesis Media would increase its scale in Canada, creating a strong agency presence across the three main centres of Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver.

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