February 2, 2012
By Christo Volschenk
No-one can say Finnish media group Alma Media is slow in ratcheting up its online classifieds business – a strategy it adopted on Nov. 1 last year. On Dec. 21, 2011 it announced the acquisition of three job portals in eastern Europe for €34.4 million ($46 million U.S.) (read here). Today it announced another job portal acquisition, namely...Spir Communication has reported turnover for the fourth quarter of 2011 of €155 million – an increase of 10.9 percent over the previous year, with notable growth from both its distribution and media (including website) divisions.
Spir’s internet activities include property sites Logic-Immo.com and Lux-residence.com, as well as auto sites Lacentrale.fr and Caradisiac.com. Of these, the property sites saw turnover up 20...
French property portal and free magazine publisher Acheter-Louer reported that it’s overall turnover was up 16 percent on last year, but that the online side had risen 55 percent and now accounts for nearly a third of the company’s income. By comparison the press side of the business saw only a 3.6 percent rise.
In part this is a reflection of general trends in the market, but it is also the return on the company...
By Christo Volschenk
The race between private accommodation platforms Airbnb and 9Flats must be tough. Judged by the way the two competitors exchange blows. The latest tit-for-tat between the two has to do with advertising – an expensive issue for most start-ups.A few weeks ago Berlin-based 9Flats.com came up with the good idea of pulling an investor in who can reduce its...
January 30, 2012
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Classified revenue continued to slide at Gannett during Q4 and all of last year, both in the U.S. and the U.K., but CareerBuilder provided a very bright spot for the company — so much so that CareerBuilder sales commissions and bonuses substantially increased expenses for the company.
Gannett reported earnings in 2011 of $1.89 per share or $459 million, down 22 percent from the $588 million reported in 2010. (The company reports on a 52-week basis.)
Quarterly income was...
With everyone and their brother getting into the daily deal business model, it’s time to start specializing. Toronto-based Dealfind has decided that moms need their own site and has launched YesMom in Calgary, with more Canadian cities due to be added throughout 2012.
What kind of deals are moms interested in? Says YesMom: family memories, fashion, health and...
January 26, 2012
By Christo Volschenk
On Nov. 1, 2011 Finnish media group Alma Media announced a restructuring, aimed at accelerating digital growth and improving operational efficiency. Today the company announced the merger of its regional and local newspaper units into a single business unit called Alma Regional Media – and named the first casualties.Juha Ruotsalainen, managing director of Aamulehti Publishing and Matti Ilmivalta, managing...
by Christo Volschenk
In an interview with a group journalist Christian Unger, CEO of Swiss media group Ringier, said in Davos, Switzerland today “2012 will be a year of acquisitions” for the company.“We are in talks with a big company in East Europe. Furthermore, we have a long watchlist of small and medium-sized businesses we would like to acquire,” Unger said.
Ringier finalized the acquisition of a 70-percent stake in the...
January 25, 2012
A quick piece of Groupon news with a Canadian spin: the group-buying powerhouse purchased a Vancouver startup called OpenCal in Sept. 2011. Last month, Groupon began a pilot test of “Groupon Scheduler”, which the Canadian website TechVibes says is directly based on OpenCal’s software.
Groupon Scheduler is an online appointment service that provides merchants...