After days of speculation, the official confirmation.
Former BPL scion and Rajya Sabha member Rajeev Chandrasekhar‘s “strategic partnership alliance” with Express publications for control of Kannada Prabha is now out.
Below is the full text.
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“Jupiter Media and Entertainment Ventures (Jupiter) and Express Publications (Madurai) Limited (EPML) today announced a strategic alliance that will jointly pursue media opportunities in various languages.
“Initially, this partnership will cover Jupiter taking equity investments in Kannada Prabha, a leading Kannada daily newspaper, subsequently exploring potential opportunities in other languages.
“This alliance will enable a vast synergy between two of Kannada’s most respected news brands, namely Kannada Prabha and Suvarna News 24×7, especially in the wide editorial network across Karnataka and product and space marketing. This partnership and strategic alliance will help propel these two brands and products into leadership positions, by giving the best in editorial, news reporting and features acceptable to millions of readers.
“This is the first time in India that two leaders and well-entrenched players of print and TV medium are coming together. The resultant alliance is bound to unlock new opportunities in Karnataka and beyond, in turn benefiting various stakeholders such as readers/viewers, employees and advertisers.”
Cartoon: courtesy The Telegraph, Calcutta
Also read: Tomorrow’s news today: spot the difference
Rajeev Chandrasekhar eyeing Kannada Prabha?
Rajeev Chandrasekhar eyeing Deccan Herald?
Tags: Churumuri, Express Publications, Juiputer Media, Kannada Prabha, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Sans Serif
27 March 2010 at 6:59 pm
nOthing surprising.Aftert the demise of Goenka. Indian Express has lost its stature and so are the sister publications. Goenkas successors are too eager to hive of the publicationsto the suitors. This is only the beginning. More may follow.
Rajiv Chandrasekhar is in public life well known in the art of acquiring clouts of sorts. This is his acquisition. It is only hoped that like the Times he would not kill the Kannada Prabha, in favour of his own brand which may come later.
27 March 2010 at 8:04 pm
Why doesn’t a eminent Kannadiga own a media house of newspaper and TV will always remain a mystery.
28 March 2010 at 12:46 am
Well kannadigas support is always conditional, on caste gotra etyadi…
Just look at the scorn directed at former PM, for a start and compare with the neighbor andhra.
28 March 2010 at 2:02 am
@murthy,
cos apparently kannadigas prefer to stick to their verbal gossiping rather than bothering to put gossip into print
;)
29 March 2010 at 3:21 pm
We have had malayalee minister in our state cabinets, there were very senior Mallu ministers (obviously Cong-I) during Bangarappa’s time too. The day is not far when we will have a mallu CM too!
29 March 2010 at 10:36 pm
MNIM
You are absolutely right…the building next to Manipal center is proof of the pelf a minister made during bangarappa’s time.
30 March 2010 at 2:07 am
Murthy saar,
What about Prajavani and deccan herald :)…arent they owned by Kannadiga Late Netakallappa/Guruswamy etc.
30 March 2010 at 6:41 pm
This is better than dh/pv going into jupiter fold.
The entire kannadaprabha team had moved to suvarna. now kannada prabha itself is moving to suvarna.
I dont read kannada prabha regularly, – i have read that under ranganath’s editorship, kannadaprabha was a fairly good newspaper. however, ranganath and team’s perormance on suvarna tv does not seem any good – blindly apeing english news channels. When will we get some serious hard-hitting stories on real issues and come out of sensationalizing.
There were rumours of sudha murthy starting a newspaper – probably those were without any basis. I wonder what kind of aggressive marketing tactics jupiter group will use. Whom will they take share from (if they do) – PV or VK? Will KP change the game in any way at all – it needed vijay sankeshwara to chnage the market landscape in karnataka – he simply quadrupuled the mkt size in a few years. Interesting space to watch.
30 March 2010 at 6:45 pm
Vijayakarnataka itself is a very good success story of 2 kannadigas Vijay Sankeshwar and Vishveshwara Bhat duo. It summarily eliminated the other 2 biggies Prajavani and Kannadprabha when it came into the market.
5 May 2010 at 6:16 pm
Congratulations mr rajiv its a very good decition print and electronic media coming together. kannada prabha need a agressive and visuliser like u wish u all the best
19 October 2010 at 2:09 pm
4 Year back …Vijayakarnataka was taken over by Times !! ..it’s part of Time of India group now and doing well !!
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/business/india-business/Times-Group-acquires-newspaper-co-in-Karnataka/articleshow/1651965.cms
7 February 2011 at 3:10 pm
vishweshwrabhat may join kanndaprabha as a chief editor.