Sky strikes £600m broadcasting deal with English Football League

Sky has struck a new £600m broadcasting deal with the English Football League, with the agreement also allowing clubs to livestream matches directly to fans from their own websites. Under the five-year deal that begins in 2019, Sky will screen up to 150 matches each season from the EFL‘s professional divisions below the Premier League. Games from the Sky Bet play-offs, Carabao Cup and Checkatrade trophy are also included. The EFL said the deal represented a year-on-year increase of 36 per cent on its current broadcasting deal with Sky.

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Tarsus extends JV with E.J. Krause in Mexico

Press Release: Tarsus Group plc (LSE:TRS), the international business-to-business media group, announces that it has agreed terms with E.J. Krause & Associates, Inc. (“EJK”) to expand its 50% owned joint venture (the “JV”) in Mexico, resulting in the JV now owning all EJK Mexico’s event portfolio

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CBS to purchase Network Ten in Australia

The Receivers and Managers (Christopher Hill, Phil Carter and David McEvoy of PPB Advisory) and the Voluntary Administrators (Mark Korda, Jarrod Villani and Jenny Nettleton of KordaMentha Restructuring) of Ten Network Holdings Limited have announced that wholly owned entities of the New York Stock Exchange-listed CBS Corporation have entered into a binding transaction document to acquire the business and assets of Network Ten.

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XLMedia buys financial services comparison site

Digital performance marketing company XLMedia continued its buying spree today with a swoop on a US comparison website. The Aim-listed firm has added young adult personal finance site Moneyunder30.com to its portfolio for $7m (£5.4m). XLMedia is targeting further US expansion, following its acquisition of Canadian credit card comparison site Greedyrates.

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Daily Mail looks to sell Metro freesheet

DMGT, which is ultimately controlled by Viscount Rothermere, has appointed boutique advisory firm Cardean Bell to work on a strategic review of the free newspaper, City sources said. Metro, the freesheet that was set up in 1999 and within five years drew a readership of 1m, could change hands for between £25m and £35m

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MCI Acquires Wyndham Jade to Boost U.S. Growth

MCI has announced the acquisition of Dallas, Texas-based Wyndham Jade, an event and travel management company specializing in integrated convention housing and registration, site selection, meeting management, incentive programs and business travel management, serving both associations and corporations

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Reed Business Information agrees to divest several websites and magazines

Reed Business Information (RBI) has announced today that it has agreed to divest personneltoday.com, personneltodayjobs.com, Occupational Health & Wellbeing, whatmedia.co.uk and the Recruitment Advertising Awards, and their associated products, services and events, to DVV Media International Limited, the UK professional publishing division of Rheinishe Post. Terms were not disclosed.

This decision reflects RBI’s continuing strategic priority of focusing on its data and analytics business.

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Relx buys Bepress to boost academic publishing

Relx, the UK-listed information and analytics group, is buying California-based academic publisher Bepress — its third acquisition in the San Francisco Bay area in the past 18 months. Although Relx did not disclose the amount its science and health business Elsevier had paid for the company, which was founded in 1999 by three academics at the University of California, Berkeley, one person briefed on the deal valued the transaction at £100m.

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Saudi investor buys significant stake in the Independent

A Saudi investor has taken a significant stake in the Independent, potentially pumping millions of pounds into the liberal news website but may spark a controversy about the human rights record of the Middle Eastern country. The deal, which was first report by Middle East Eye, could value the Independent at more than £100m

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Handelsblatt acquires majority ownership in German-based Euroforum

London: Informa (LSE: INF.L), the International Exhibitions, Events, Business Intelligence and Academic Publishing Group, today announces the majority acquisition of its German/Swiss domestic conference business Euroforum by leading German media group, Verlagsgruppe Handelsblatt GmbH. The transaction continues the strategy of portfolio focus within the Knowledge & Networking Division, following on from a number of other portfolio changes over recent years in Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands, Russia, Spain, Portugal, South Africa and Brazil. It leaves the Division focused on specialist communities in its core end markets of Global Finance, Life Sciences and TMT.

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Guardian Media Group cuts losses by more than a third

The parent company of the Guardian and Observer cut its losses by more than a third to £45m in the last financial year and more than quadrupled its number of paying members, as it seeks to break even within two years. Guardian Media Group said total revenues increased by 2.4% to £214.5m in the year to 2 April, thanks to the popularity of its membership scheme, one-off contributions and growth in international operations

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