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Industry Moves: Former Vodafone Exec Geitner Joins BBC Worldwide’s Board
Telefonica Lines Up Six Bidders For Endemol Stake
Interview, Part 1: Quincy Smith, President, CBS Interactive: ‘Innertube Just Became OuterTubeS
Interview, Part 1: Quincy Smith, President, CBS Interactive: ‘Innertube Just Became OuterTube’
The CBC Interactive Audience Network moved from idea to execution—at least, announcements—in the span of 8 days or so, according to Quincy Smith, president of CBS Interactive and the guy at the center of the storm. (No telling how long some of these deals have been in the works.) But, during an interview today, he admitted freely that the ground already was broken by the NBCU-News Corp. JV and that this couldn’t have happened as quickly without it: “Full tribute and credit to the JV for all of their good work in bushwhacking.” It blazed the way, he added: “It got out there and established economics that seemed appropriate for the content versus online distribution for now.” He also doesn’t claim to be doing anything new or original. In fact, Smith says he hopes every media company follows suit. What follows is part one of some edited excerpts:
Why go this route?: “If you’re a content company the opportunity of online is to be closer than ever to your audience. You want to find as many leading distribution platforms as you can to get your content there. I don’t think the world needs another portal and clearly, all of the partners we’ve announced—and hopefully some soon to come—represent having done much better jobs than CBS at creating video delivery platforms.”
What does this do to CBS broadband site Innertube?: Smith: “Innertube just became Outertube. It’s basically Innertube on steroids. Anything that’s available on Innertube now gets actually pushed to people with real eyeballs. The people that matter: audience and advertisers. Advertisers deserve mass out of CBS, the largest television network on the planet and we should second that with online mass.” He offered as a scenario taking a Monday night comedy, then creating an audience for it that’s bigger than the Super Bowl by Friday. Smith: “This is a real chance to make numbers matter and at CBS that is what moves needles.” Along those lines, CBS is working on ways to improve research and online metrics reporting. “It’s not only a luxury. It’s something we all have to understand because we’re not competing against each other. Don’t make this a JV versus us -- we’re competing with lonelygirl ... we’re also sharing with lonelygirl because that’s the webby thing to do.”
More for the same audience or growing audience?: Smith: “As you do know, CBS’s traditional demographics remain and skew relatively older so any progress we make online is reasonably additive.” Also, CBS Corp. is 90 percent U.S. based; most of the partners are 70-plus percent international. “There’s a whole new world for CBS.”
Rights: CBS owns most of the shows being licensed—“that’s the beauty of being a big, dumb media company”—but sports rights are a different matter. For instance, the NCAA mens basketball could be on air, online and on mobile but the Masters’ was only on air and online—and only part of it was online. As Smith points out, the NFL is guarding its online rights. “We hope by announcing distribution deals like this we can help to make sure that the leagues are exposed to the audience online if they choose to work it so the rights come with us they can piggyback all day long—or maybe it just incents them to go direct as well.” They’re working to clear additional rights to put more content in the rotation.
Moving beyond experimental: CBS still makes some experimental deals—SecondLife and the like—but Smith says these aren’t among them. “This is more than just trying things ... this is about making a forward statement towards the audience as well as getting paid for that. .. We are definitely moving beyond the experiment. We need to be paid for our content and we need to have eyeballs watch it.”
Autoplay: When I brought up autoplay as a way of piling up streams, Smith quickly replied: “That’s a cheap shot. We don’t do it. ... Half of that is the decision of the content provider. ... In my opinion, to open something and have it directly stream in your face and then count as a stream is a cheap shot.”
Continue in Part Two.
Industry Moves: FIM European Head David Fischer Leaves
David Fischer, the managing director of Fox Interactive Europe, has left the company, according to an internal memo sent out by MySpace CEO Chris DeWolfe...he is leaving after a year. Travis Katz SVP & General Manager of FIM International will act as interim MD of Europe. No indication where Fischer is going to.
Ofcom CEO: UK Needs Public Funded Online Media ‘To Protect Against Imports’
The CEO of UK media regulator Ofcom says Britain needs a strong online antidote to “American imports”. Consultation closed a fortnight ago on Ofcom’s plans for a new “public service publisher” (PSP), a planned new publicly owned national web producer in the mould of the BBC with a suggested budget of up to £100 million ($200 million). The plans have been welcomed by digital rights advocates and companies vying to be picked as the PSP. In an interview with Ofcomwatch published today, Ofcom’s Ed Richards: “We want a new media, Web 2.0, or whatever you want to call it, content capacity in Britain, which is British, in the same way that [we] have uniquely British content in the traditional broadcasting world. Otherwise, we run the risk that the only good television will be American imports and the rest of it is rubbish ... because the US market is so big, so you can risk far more, spend far more, spend more time in development. So the basic premise is the same as it was for broadcasting – it’s just that we live in a different world now.” Richards’ comparisons between broadcast TV and the web may draw suspicion from online die-hards, who may ask - if the two are so similar, don’t the existing public service remits of the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 (each of which is also a web publisher), plus the fact any online Brit can make a website, preclude any risk of US dominance?
ITV Software Firm Ensequence Raises $40 Million In Third Round
Interactive video company Ensequence has received $40 million in its third funding round. The company plans to use the funding for global expansion efforts, including opening new offices in New York and Los Angeles. Its last funding round netted $18 million in August 2004. As we reported at that time, the Portland, Ore.-based company had previously secured $19 million in private funding.
The latest investment comes from an unidentified private equity firm. Ensequence has marketed its on-Q software ITV programming tool since 2002. The new funding will also go towards developing its next generation version of on-Q. The software tool has been used mostly in the U.K., but it said it has breaking into U.S. broadband, with interactive online services for MLB. Rounding Ensequence’s ambitions are plans for a tool for mobile video. Release
Dow Jones Preparing Buy London’s eFinancialNews For $53 Million: Report
Dow Jones is set to acquire London-based investment banking newspaper Financial News for approximately $53 million, according to Telegraph UK, which said an announcement could be made within days.
In addition to its weekly print version, the Financial News has its own real-time financial news site, eFinancialNews with around 40,000 subscribers. The company was founded by a group of London business journalists in 1990s.
Last year eFinancialGroup, a sister company to Financial News, sold its jobs website eFinancialCareers.com to U.S.-based online recruiter Dice, which is owned by General Atlantic Partners and Quadrangle, for about $94 million.
Related:
-- eFinancialNews Bought By Investor Group; eFinancialGroup Brought Separately By Dice
European Newspapers ‘Optimistic’ About Print And Digital
A wide-ranging AP article surveying the European newspaper landscape finds editors “optimistic” about both the web and the survival of print. The gist: while US newspapers self-flagellate in pursuit of a purpose and a business model in this digital age, European counterparts “see the online media explosion more as an opportunity than as a threat.” A curious mix of surveyed European publishing execs expresses typical confidence in both the survival of newsprint and the expansion of online; Le Monde and Italy’s Corriere della Sera say the papers will likely become the space for longer-form investigations, with breaking news handled primarily on the web.
But, while titles like the UK’s Telegraph have fundamentally repositioned their business for multimedia publishing, some of the promises in which others express confidence (electronic paper, video) sound like the same kind of hypotheticals that have reverberated inside this business for several years. Though not as pronounced as in the US, European print circulations are falling, too, and many of the publishers now staying afloat have the online advertising boom to thank.
Related:
-- UK Telegraph’s Digital & Print Integration May Cost 70 More Jobs
Virgin Radio Broadcasts To Wii And Playstation 3 Entertainment Hubs
Virgin Radio, UK, the rock station once owned by Richard Branson, has begun streaming on to Sony Playstation 3 and Nintendo Wii consoles, Guardian reports. Virgin is taking advantage of that fact it’s the only such station to offer a clean MP3 stream by plugging the stream into a Flash applet accessible via the web browsers on the machines. It is the first time a UK radio station has been made available on a games console and is clearly a nod to the Trojan Horse notion that games boxes could become home entertainment hubs. Sister stations Xtreme, Classic Rock and Groove are also available; the app also includes retail options for music and concerts but is not yet available for Xbox 360. Digital media director James Cridland: “People now treat consoles as part of their home entertainment media center. Plus the platform has great growth potential, particularly among early-adopters and the 25-44 audience popular with advertisers.”
Content Management Provider EZ Systems Receives $5 Million
Norway’s eZ Systems, a maker of open source content management software, has raised $5 million from local BTV Invest. The funding is an expansion round and eZ’s founders and employees remain majority shareholders. Aside from its native country headquarters, eZ has offices in Ukraine, France, Canada and Germany. The company has been around since 1999 and says its software has been downloaded 2 million times. (Via Alarm Clock Euro.) eZ recently added a search function for users as well as a payment platform as an add on.
Release.
French Startup Iminent Raises Nearly $4 Million For IM Video App
Iminent, a French startup that provides video-add-on applications for instant messaging systems, has secured nearly $4 million from French-Italian investment group 360 Partners, AC reports. Iminent’s video system, which is currently in beta test mode, allows users to make short videos and attach them to IM when chatting. IMer’s can use “emovids,” which is a short animation that is intended to serve the same function as an emoticon. The company’s website says that the application is free, though it offer any other details about how it is to be marketed.
Industry Moves: BSkyB’s Jonesco To Build Portal; Emap, Lastminute.com Directors
-- UK satellite broadcaster BSkyB has given more detail on the post to be taken up by AOL UK MD Andy Jonesco. Currently on gardening leave, Jonesco takes the new position of MD, Online Business Unit (OBU), tasked with exploiting web advertising opportunities and, according to mad.co.uk, “he will oversee development of a full-service portal for Sky customers that will provide a full suite of web tools together with a range of rich content from Sky and third parties”. Shouldn’t be too much trouble - apart from the Google Video-powered new user-gen video site SkyCast, BSkyB already has a deal with the search site that gives sky.com customers branded Gmail accounts and more (a variant of Mountain View’s white label Apps On Your Domain package); might it be possible to speculate Google Personalized Homepage to tick the “portal” box? Meanwhile, Paul Wright has been appointed sales director for Sky Digital Media, a web ad sales division.
-- Emap: The AOL exodus continues. Interim head of portal development Jonathan Turpin has left to take up the first of Emap’s three new digital director positions. Turpin will become digital director in the company’s radio division; two more digital appointments are coming soon in its lifestyle and specialist consumer divisions. Turpin has previously been CEO of the Fish4 classifieds network and held positions with early BBC online properties.
-- Lastminute.com: Elsewhere in UK shake-ups, travel retailer and 90s dot.com poster child Lastminute.com has appointed Alistair Daly as marketing director. The company last month lured new CMO Simon Thompson from Motorola Europe, but Daly will report to UK MD Mark Jones.
Ofcom: Half Of UK Homes Have Broadband; ISP Revenue Up 18 Percent
UK broadband services’ revenue is up 18 percent on last year. That’s because half of all adults now live in a broadband-wired home, pushing high-speed ISP takings up to £1.8 billion ($3.5 billion), according to a report from media regulator Ofcom. Anecdotally, a sea change has occurred in UK internet culture in the last year or two, with more people web browsing and social networking thanks to falling broadband costs. In the figures, Ofcom says a majority (51 percent) have used that connectivity to download video (26 percent of them do it weekly), and 15 percent have uploaded some video at least once. The cost of a 2Mbit line has fallen by two thirds in the last three years. Bad news for the mobile internet, though - while a third of Britons own a web-enabled mobile phone, only half have ever used it to go online, citing lack of interest (43 percent) and high prices (31 percent).
- The Communications Market: Digital Progress Report
EU IPTV Market To Double This Year, Most Growth In UK: Report
European IPTV subscriptions will double from 2.9 million last year to 5.6 million in 2007, according to research from Screen Digest. Largely as a result of mergers and acquisitions, many telcos now offer television services over fixed-line broadband to TV set-top boxes. Although Screen Digest acknowledges such offerings tend to be “inferior to cable and satellite,” it predicts IPTV revenue to grow from EUR470 million ($628 million) to over EUR1 billion ($1.3 billion), with the UK contributing the fastest growth - a 250 percent increase (from 80,000 subscribers to 300,000) off the back of BT’s new Vision IPTV service and similar upcoming launches from Orange and Tiscali. These predictions have not yet borne out, however - research by Morgan Stanley last week found that even mighty BT’s offering had only attracted 5,000 customers in its first four months, 40 percent of whom are staff of the telco.
Apple May Face $600 Million in EU Fines On Music Pricing Differential
Nevermind the EMI-Apple announcement, the shine may come of soon: Apple faces a fine of more than $600 million after the European Commission issued a formal objection to the higher prices it charges to download music from iTunes in Britain compared with the rest of the European continent, reports Times UK. Apple charges 79p in Britain for a song and 99 euro cents in Europe. On current exchange rates the equivalent of the European price would be 67p. On the DRM-free songs announced today, Apple will sell those songs in UK for 99p...the same songs will be available in Europe for Euro 1.29, equivalent to 87p.
The commission said that it objected to Apple’s practice of making consumers buy songs from the iTunes shop in their home country. As a result, it said: “Consumers are restricted in their choice of where to buy music, and consequently what music is available and at what price.”
FT: The Brussels regulator last week sent a confidential statement of objections outlining the accusations to Apple and to “major record companies”. These are understood to include Universal, Warner, EMI and Sony BMG.
Apple’s reaction to all this: “Apple has always wanted to operate a single, pan-European iTunes store...But we were advised by the music labels and publishers that there were certain legal limits to the rights they could grant us.”
Content-Economics: Paid Content
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ICANN Turns Down Request For Adult Site Domain
ICANN, the agency that regulates internet domains, rejected a proposal for adult entertainment sites to have their own three-x top domain. Among other reasons, supporters want to make it easier to safeguard children from accessing the sites—a not-insubstantial argument. But ICANN chairman Vint Cerfe and the majority of the board opposed the idea of acting as a content regulator, voting 9-5 with one abstention to reject the current three-year-old application at this week’s meeting in Portugal. (Meeting transcript.) The board said the request raised public policy and law enforcement issues, adding that: “there are credible scenarios that lead to circumstances in which ICANN would be forced to assume an ongoing management and oversight role regarding Internet content, which is inconsistent with its technical mandate.” It was rejected in 2006, too.
MKTW: “When asked at a press event later in the day if the board would ever revisit the issue, Cerf said ‘over my dead body.’”
Susan Crawford, dissenting board member, on her blog: “I found the resolution adopted by the Board ... both weak and unprincipled. I am troubled by the path the Board has followed on this issue since I joined the Board in December of 2005. I would like to make two points. First, ICANN only creates problems for itself when it acts in an ad hoc fashion in response to political pressures. Second, ICANN should take itself seriously as a private governance institution with a limited mandate and should resist efforts by governments to veto what it does.” This is just a small excerpt for those interested in more detail head to her entry. (via Wired News)
AP has a good FAQ on the ICANN domain process.
ICANN Turns Down Request For Adult Site Domain
ICANN, the agency that regulates internet domains, rejected a proposal for aduly entertainment sites to have their own three-x top domain. Among other reasons, supporters want to make it easier to safeguard children from accessing the sites—a not-insubstantial argument. But ICANN chairman Vint Cerfe and the majority of the board opposed the idea of acting as a content regulator, voting 9-5 with one abstention to reject the current three-year-old application at this week’s meeting in Portugal. (Meeting transcript.) The board said the request raised public policy and law enforcement issues, adding that: “there are credible scenarios that lead to circumstances in which ICANN would be forced to assume an ongoing management and oversight role regarding Internet content, which is inconsistent with its technical mandate.” It was rejected in 2006, too.
MKTW: “When asked at a press event later in the day if the board would ever revisit the issue, Cerf said ‘over my dead body.’”
Susan Crawford, dissenting board member, on her blog: “I found the resolution adopted by the Board ... both weak and unprincipled. I am troubled by the path the Board has followed on this issue since I joined the Board in December of 2005. I would like to make two points. First, ICANN only creates problems for itself when it acts in an ad hoc fashion in response to political pressures. Second, ICANN should take itself seriously as a private governance institution with a limited mandate and should resist efforts by governments to veto what it does.” This is just a small excerpt for those interested in more detail head to her entry. (via Wired News)
AP has a good FAQ on the ICANN domain process.
Russians Take Controlling Interest In Ukranian Web Portal Meta
Two Russian investment groups have acquired a 63.3 percent stake in Ukranian web portal Meta, in a deal believed to be worth around $3 million. Russian Funds Investment Group and Digital Sky Technologies, an internet fund, contributed equally in the general-purpose service, which operates search, news, email and other features and reached 1.5 million users last year, according to the Kiyv Post. They will now invest a further $1 million toward improving the search functionality sufficiently to compete with Ukranian versions of Google and Russia’s Yandex, the Post says.
UK’s Webjam Raises $2 Million In First Round For Online Community Tool
London-based online community tool Webjam has raised about $2 million in first-round funding from French early stage venture capital firm I-Source Gestion. Webjam plans to use the funds for product development and international expansion across Europe and the US.
The company was co-founded last year by Yann Motte, managing director, Alberto Barreiro, Webjam’s chief product officer, and Marcus Greenwood, director. Both Motte and Barreiro were previously with Yahoo Europe. Release
German media Firm Burda Buys Stake In Mutilmedia Sharing Site Sevenload
German media/magazine group Burda Media, though its arm Burda Digital Ventures, has taken a stake in local video and photo portal Sevenload. Burda bought one fifth of Sevenload’s shares, though other terms were not disclosed. The media company has been buying small stakes in online companies since last year.
More info in the release here.
Related:
-- Burda Media Buys 30 Percent Stake in German Nightlife Community Site
-- German Magazine Giant Burda Media Planning Major Net Acquisitions Abroad
UK’s C Squared Holdings Raises $500K From The Capital Group
C Squared Holdings, a UK-based publisher and event organizer for the advertising industry, has raised nearly $500K from The Capital Fund, PEHub reports.
C Square publishes the 17-year-old ad magazine Media & Marketing Europe. Two years ago, the company began publishing an offshoot, Cream, which covers media planning. As for events, next month, C Squared will organize The Venice Festival of Media, a two-day conference sponsored by Yahoo, AOL, Discovery Communications, Financial Times and others.
On the personnel front, the company recently named former ZenithOptimedia executive Simon Marquis as chairman, according to Brand Republic.
Founders Of Germany’s Pangora Back Travel Community Site Cosmotourist
German travel community site Cosmotourist has received backing from Dr. Christoph Roeck as an investor and business angel. Roeck left his post at product search site Pangora end of February. He will be joining his former co-managing director and founder of the Pangora, Constantin Wunn, now the managing director of Munich-based Cosmotourist. The amount of financing that Roeck will be bringing with him to Cosmotourist was not disclosed. Release
Germany’s Xing Acquires Spanish Professional Contact Net Econozco
OpenBC, which runs international business networking platform Xing, has purchased eConozco, which bills itself as the second largest Spanish professional contact network. The four-year-old eConozco network has about 150K members in the Spanish and Latin American markets. The financial terms were undisclosed. Release
As Mashable points out, Xing is trying to expand its European base to better compete against Palo Alto-based rival LinkedIn, which has been holding its own in Europe.
Related:
-- Germany Social Networking Site OpenBC/Xing Raises Euro 35.7 Million in IPO
-- Germany Social Networking Site OpenBC/Xing Sees IPO Share Listing Dec 7
DMGT Digital Revenue Up 57 Percent; UK Web Ads Overtake Print
UK News publisher DMGT more than doubled its digital revenue in 2006/07, on the back of web advertising gains. The publisher behind the Daily Mail and London’s Evening Standard newspapers posted a 57 percent online hike across the group, according to figures running to April 1 and released today. Advertising revenue from DMGT’s Associated Northcliffe Digital (AND) subsidiary is up 48 percent (or 141 percent if you factor in acquisitions). The increases will have come in part from the glut of recruitment, dating and other classifieds sites AND bought in the last year.
Most surprising, however, is an up-turn in print ad performance—despite suffering a woeful couple of years, national display ad revenue increased four percent in the last five months, although regional classified ads are down three percent on last year. GCap yesterday reported the ad market in radio, too, had begun to turn a corner.
- Wed ads surge: Online remains the fastest grower, however. According to an Internet Advertising Bureau study out today, UK internet ad spend overtook that in newspapers for the first time last year, growing 41.2 percent to break the £2 billion ($3.9 billion) barrier, while newspaper ads grew just 0.2 percent to £1.9 billion ($3.7 billion). Google made up 43 percent of that, according to The Guardian.
Save The Date: London ContentNext Mixer on May 10 @ The Savoy
After our first successful London mixer last year, we’re coming back for another one: the second London ContentNext mixer is planned for May 10, and yes, this time we have a very central location: The Savoy Hotel on The Strand. Should be a lot more fun doing it in the early summer.
If you are interested in underwriting the mixer, please e-mail us at advertising AT contentnext.com. If you have other suggestions, send me an e-mail at rali AT paidcontent.org.
Our sponsors till now: Platinum: Entriq.
Universal Backs Urban Media Company Trace
Universal Music Group will become a strategic global investor in Alliance Trace Media, owner of Trace TV, a French TV network and digital platform that is aimed at the urban youth market in countries throughout Europe, Asia and the Middle East.
While financial terms between the two were not revealed, Universal will provide global music/video rights, a weekly slot on IMF—the International Music Feed, Universal’s 24-hour cable/satellite channel, as well as cross promotion and marketing support. Universal and Trace will also sell urban music and mobile content in China.
Universal’s backing will help Trace accelerate expansion its existing operations across the web, cable, satellite, radio, IPTV and mobile platforms internationally. It hopes to launch in the US market by the end of this year or early 2008 at the latest. Release
EMI, Bertelsmann Settle; Put Napster Dispute To Rest
EMI and Bertelsmann have agreed to settle their four-year-old Napster dispute out of court. EMI was amongst a gaggle of record labels to sue the German group in 2003, claiming its investment in the then-controversial original incarnation was tantamount to copyright infringement. Bertelsmann bankrolled Napster to the tune of $85 million, drawing rival labels’ fire, before its outright acquisition was blocked on a technicality, finally forcing that iteration of Napster out of business. Terms of the settlement were not revealed but Bertelsmann admits no responsibility. Universal last year got $61 million from a similar settlement; anonymous sources in the LA Times put EMI’s pay-day at anywhere between $50 million and $150 million. EMI CEO Eric Nicoli: “We can now put this matter behind us and continue to pursue the development of new legitimate digital music business models.”
Ericsson To Take Over Tandberg, Aims For IPTV Infrastructure
Ericsson is set to take full control of Norwegian digital video company Tandberg Television after winning the support of over 90 percent of shareholders, in a deal that paves the way for its emergence into IPTV. Headquartered in Southampton, England, Tandberg makes compression and on-demand features for digital broadcasting. Ericsson had been courting the company since February, when CEO Carl-Henric Svanberg said IPTV would be “the biggest networked multimedia opportunity going forward”, bringing Ericsson new customers in the shape of cable and satellite operators. The deal involved a 106 kroner ($17) share offer.
Spanish New Media R&D Outfit i3media Gets $46 Million Funding
In Spain, production powerhouse Mediapro is teaming with telcos Telefonica and Alcatel-Lucent, and public broadcaster TVC to kickstart a new-media R&D outfit i3media with about $46.4 million in funding, reports Variety. i3media will pull together Spain’s dispersed new-media R&D community, allowing large-scale R&D previously impossible in the country, the story says. Among its aims: exploring upgrades in digital cinema sports transmissions, and reproducing the ease of Internet navigation on TV sets.
Release: i3media is one of the big 15 technology research projects selected in the second round of offers as part of the Cénit initiative, which in turn is part of the Ingenio 2010 project set up to foster public and private cooperation in audiovisual research and development.
UK Online Upgrades: Sky; FT.com and Reuters Websites
The season of website and service upgrades in UK:
-- Sky says it will do a massive overhaul of its digital offer. The new portal, possibly launching this summer, will put ina lot of NEws Corp content, and will be going head to head with competitors MSN, Yahoo, Virgin Media and AOL, the story says.
-- Financial Times’ website, pretty crappy even after the redesign in 2002, will go through a new round of redesign. NMA does a suck up: “The paper’s parent company Pearson has sanctioned a thorough redesign of the hugely successful website. It’s understood that this will be the biggest change since the last, widely praised redesign in 2002.” “Hugely successful” and “widely praised”, says the “award-winning” journalist. Wow.
-- Reuters is investing in excess of $11 million in upgrading the underlying technology platform supporting its sites. The move is to enable the company to better embrace Web 2.0 features like video, blogs, and social networking. Full migration of the Reuters US and UK homepages and news channels to the new platform will take place over the next few months, with other global sites to follow.
Google to Viacom: Be More Like BBC, We’re Not Slowing Down
Google has come out with a bullish defence against Viacom’s $1 billion copyright lawsuit. The Guardian quotes Google’s head of video content partnerships, Patrick Walker, speaking in London: “Viacom took one approach, and people like the BBC have taken another approach. We’re not slowing down in any way. It goes to tell that the usage of YouTube has grown significantly from the Viacom announcement. We don’t see it impacting our business.”
The BBC signed a carriage and ad revenue-share deal with the video sharing site last month that places short program clips on three YouTube channels. Viacom, on the other hand, served a lawsuit claiming a massive copyright abuse over YouTube’s use of some 150,000 clips. The two companies operate in different markets, of course - BBC has been charged with adding more commercial revenue streams though its content is owned by the British public, while Viacom’s material is its own to monetize.
Related:
- More on Youtube-Rivals JV: Fox, NBC and Sony; Distribution on MySpace, MSN and Yahoo
- BBC In Clips Deal With YouTube; Ad Rev Share; UK Blackout On News Clip
- Viacom Sues Google-YouTube: Wants More Than $1 Billion In Damages, Injunction
Content-Economics: Paid Content
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Bertelsmann Has $8 Billion For Acquisitions, Including Digital
Bertelsmann will have a $8 billion warchest with which to make digital (and other kinds of) media acquisitions through to 2010. Announcing annual figures, Europe’s largest media company said profit more than doubled in 2006. Now it is dropping a self-imposed ban on acquisitions (introduced to cut debt resulting from the buy-back of a 25 percent stake), and is focused on buying itself success in the new media ecosystem. The cash will be free from next year, if debt falls as expected.
- CFO Thomas Rabe: “We will again have financial scope of between $1.6 billion and $2 billion per year for acquisitions and $935 million for other ongoing investments”.
- Times: “Gunther Thielen, the company’s outgoing chief executive, said that there were no obvious gaps in Bertelsmann’s existing divisions. However, the company wanted to target fresh assets that ultimately it could integrate. When pressed to clarify target areas, he said that it was difficult to identify which new-media businesses would be sustainable: ‘Those who are too early will be punished and so will those who are too late.’”
Bertlesmann will not target telecoms infrastructure providers, however, according to Reuters.
Ten percent of the acquisition budget will go toward a private equity fund that will target media companies and is joined by Citigroup Private Equity and Morgan Stanley Principal Investments. Amongst Bertelsmann’s boldest online acquisitions was its failed purchase of Napster in 2002. Whilst the group has effective television, magazine and book divisions, it is seen as needing to up its game on the net once more.
Related:-
- Bertelsmann Forms $63 Million Venture Fund; Sarnoff Heading It
- Bertelsmann’s New Web-Friendly CEO; Deals Coming?
Spotzer Closes Third Funding Round; Readies Launch of Digital TV Agency
Netherlands-based digital/TV ad agency Spotzer Media Group, trying to compete against the likes of SpotRunner, closed its third financing round this week. Fellow countrymen Cyrte Investments, which focuses on telecom, media and technology companies, led the round, the amount of which was not released.
Spotzer is currently offering a sneak preview of its video ad work on its website. Spotzer, which has 20 clients so far, targets small local business, which can choose from hundreds of ready-to-air ads, allowing them to bypass traditional agencies that would charge much more to create custom work.
Spotzer was started by Andrew Klein, who previously founded an investment bank, Wit Capital, in 1996. The firm was partially owned by Goldman Sachs, went public in 1998, and ultimately was acquired by brokerage company Charles Schwab. Klein serves as Spotzer’s Chairman and CEO.
Spotzer’s previous fundings have been backed by post-production house DutchView, as well as investments by individual investors from the U.S. and Europe. Release
Related:
-- Interactive Ad Agency Spotzer Raises Second Round Financing
Industry Moves: New Lastminute.com CMO Comes From Motorola
Motorola’s European marketing director Simon Thompson has joined Lastminute.com as chief marketing officer. A Motorola spokesperson, speaking to mad.co.uk, said: “Thompson, who has held the post of European marketing director at Motorola for the past year, has resigned from Motorola to take on a new post. [Neil] Stuart, currently marketing lead for the EMEA & India region, will be taking over Thompson’s responsibilities in Europe from the beginning of April.”
Thompson, who was responsible for our line of the day during our Online Publishers’ Association coverage from London this month, had spearheaded an imminent campaign for Motorola’s Rizr launch and, previously, as Honda marketing director, worked on the “impossible dream” campaign.
Related:-
-- OPA London: Line Of The Day
UK Media Regulator To Investigate Pay TV, BSkyB Concerns
Richard Branson’s Virgin Media has convinced UK media regulator Ofcom to investigate Rupert Murdoch’s BSkyB digital satellite network over the withdrawal of several of its channels from digital cable and terrestrial platforms. Also a channel operator, Sky pulled several entertainment and news channels this month from Virgin (formerly ntl/Telewest) after the companies failed to negotiate financial terms of a new carriage deal, meaning the loss of shows like Lost for 3.3 million viewers. Ofcom just announced it “will investigate the pay TV market” following a joint complaint from BT, Setanta, Top Up TV, and Virgin Media.
Why have the others joined Virgin? This wide-ranging investigation portends broader competition concerns as the UK’s digital TV providers - many of which also now provide broadband, mobile and telco service - vie for market share. Though Virgin has countered by launching an on-demand, pseudo-PVR service, the loss of key shows is a blow to the newly rebranded company. Murdoch’s Sky is winning few friends in the business so far this year, having recently announced separate plans to pull some channels from the Freeview digital terrestrial TV platform to free up space for its own premium offerings, requiring consumers to buy a new set-top box and subscription card. A parallel investigation is already ongoing after Sky ruffled feathers by purchasing a 17.9 percent stake in ITV, designed to thwart a probable takeover bid from Virgin. If it finds the market is unfair, Ofcom could refer BSkyB to the Competition Commission.
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