Capita helps to maximise BBC licence fees and is awarded contract extension until 2022 December 19, 2016 Support services firm Capita has sealed a contract extension with the BBC to ensure the broadcaster maximises TV licence collections. The two-year add-on means the FTSE 100 firm's partnership with Auntie will run until 2022, by which time it will have administered TV licensing for 20 years. Read more: Capita share price at 10-year low as it issues [...]
Rupert Murdoch pleads with newspaper to stop using “fake news” quote December 19, 2016 Rupert Murdoch has written to the Guardian, asking the newspaper to stop attributing a "fake" quote to him. The executive chairman of 21st Century Fox, which last week agreed an £11.7bn deal to takeover Sky, has taken issue with the following quote: “When I go into Downing Street, they do what I say; when I [...]
Protein’s Will Rowe talks early adopters, audience insights and brands “doing good” December 19, 2016 "I was a really bad web designer… that’s how it all started,” chuckles Will Rowe, founder and chief executive of Protein. We’re in his Shoreditch office, a space resembling the bedroom of my teenage dreams; a well trodden cow hide is stretched over the corrugated steel floor below shelves laden with volumes of glossy magazines. [...]
Facebook has explained some of the ways it is trying to tackle fake news December 16, 2016 Facebook has set out some of the ways it is trying to address fake news and hoax stories. Both Facebook and Google have faced strong criticism in recent weeks over a proliferation of false news stories during the US presidential race. The digital giants both promised to crack down on advertising against fake news last [...]
Daily Mirror publisher’s shares soar despite 17 per cent decline in print advertising revenue December 16, 2016 Trinity Mirror, the publisher of the Mirror national newspapers and more than 150 regional titles, is expecting a 17 per cent drop in advertising revenue in the last quarter of this year. However, shares in the company jumped eight per cent on Friday morning after it reported a performance “marginally ahead of expectations”, with its [...]
A £17m paper trade: Johnston Press sells 13 East Anglia titles as part of debt reduction strategy December 16, 2016 The owner of the i newspaper has flogged 13 of its print titles in a "landmark" deal that will raise £17m. Johnston Press confirmed it will sell its East Anglia titles to Iliffe Media Limited having previously said it was in a late-stage discussions over the sale in November. Read more: Struggling newspaper group Johnston Press [...]
Editor’s notes: Forget about Murdoch, media dominance is now an online battle December 16, 2016 For a while this week it felt as if we’d slipped back five years, as Ed Miliband and Vince Cable dusted down their criticisms of Rupert Murdoch. 21st Century Fox’s bid for Sky saw the former Labour leader take to Twitter like a student protester. “Do we want Rupert Murdoch controlling even more of [the] [...]
Murdoch swoops: 21st Century Fox agrees Sky takeover deal December 15, 2016 Rupert Murdoch's 21st Century Fox today agreed a takeover deal for UK broadcaster Sky. Fox, which already owns 39 per cent of Sky, has made a £10.75-per-share offer, worth £11.7bn. The approach values the whole of the UK media giant at £18.5bn. Fox said it would be using a scheme of arrangement, meaning it would need 75 [...]
Rupert Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox set to make firm offer for Sky as early as tomorrow December 14, 2016 Rupert Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox is set to lodge a firm offer for Sky as early as tomorrow morning, City A.M. understands. Fox is not expected to stray from the £10.75-per-share value that it had previously agreed to informally with Sky. Read more: More pressure on Murdoch's Fox-Sky deal as pensions lobby group wades in [...]
Shortlist narrows for BBC chairmanship December 14, 2016 The shortlist for the new BBC chairmanship has narrowed to around six, with the government aiming to name the successful candidate early next year. Former Prudential chairman and Bank of England deputy governor Sir David Clementi, who was one of the architects of the new system under which the position has been created, is reported to [...]