News Corporation

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News Corporation
Type of Company Public: (NYSE: NWS, NYSE: NWSa, ASX: NWS, LSE: NCRA)
Founded Adelaide, Australia (1979)
Headquarters Incorporated in Wilmington, Delaware, USA, headquartered in New York City
Key people Rupert Murdoch, CEO and Chairman
Peter Chernin, COO
David DeVoe, CFO
Industry Mass media
Products Film and television production, television networks, satellite television, newspapers and magazines, book publishing, sports, websites
Revenue USD $25.327 billion (Y.E. 30 June 2006)
Employees 47,300 (2006)
Website www.newscorp.com

News Corporation (abbreviated to News Corp) (NYSE: NWS, NYSE: NWSa, ASX: NWS, LSE: NCRA) is one of the world's largest media conglomerates. Its chief executive officer is Rupert Murdoch, who created the Fox Broadcasting Company in 1986.

News Corporation is a public company listed on the New York Stock Exchange and the Australian Stock Exchange and as a secondary listing on the London Stock Exchange. Formerly incorporated in Adelaide, Australia, the company was re-incorporated in the United States state of Delaware after a majority of shareholders approved the move on 12 November 2004.

News Corporation's headquarters is on Sixth Avenue (Avenue of the Americas) in New York City, in the 1960s-1970s portion of the Rockefeller Center complex.

Revenue for the year ended 30 June 2005 was $23.859 billion. This does not include News Corporation's share of the revenue of businesses in which it owns a minority stake, which include two of its most important assets, DirecTV and BSkyB. Almost 70% of the company's sales come from its US businesses.

Contents

[edit] History

See News International, News Limited and Rupert Murdoch for more history.

News Corporation was created in 1980 by Rupert Murdoch as a holding company for News Limited. News Limited was created by Murdoch from the assets he inherited in 1952 following the death of his father, Sir Keith Murdoch, and subsequent expansion. The main asset left to him was ownership of the Adelaide News.

In 1986 and 1987, News Corp (through subsidiary News International) moved to adjust the production process of its British newspapers, over which the printing unions had long maintained a highly restrictive grip[citation needed]. A number of senior Australian media moguls were brought into Murdoch's powerhouse, including the infamous John Dux, who was managing director of the South China Post. This led to a confrontation with the printing unions NGA and SOGAT. The move of News International's London operation to Wapping in the East End resulted in nightly battles outside the new plant. Delivery vans and depots were frequently and violently attacked[citation needed]. Ultimately the unions capitulated and other media companies soon followed Murdoch's lead in the Wapping dispute.

[edit] Moving into the United States

Murdoch had made his first acquisition in the United States in 1973, when he purchased the San Antonio Express-News. Soon afterwards he founded the National Star, a supermarket tabloid, and in 1976 he purchased the New York Post. In 1981 News Corp. bought half the movie studio 20th Century Fox, buying the other half in 1984. In 1985 News Corp. announced it was buying the Metromedia group of stations, setting the stage for the launch of a fourth U.S. broadcast network. On September 4, 1985, Murdoch became a naturalized citizen to satisfy the legal requirement that only United States citizens could own American television stations. In 1986, the Metromedia deal closed, and the Fox Broadcasting Company was launched. This network, known on-screen only as "Fox", can now be picked up in over 96% of U.S. households. In 1987 he bought The Herald and Weekly Times Ltd in Australia, the company that his father had once managed. By 1991, his Australian-based News Corp. had amassed huge debts, which forced Murdoch to sell many of the American magazine interests he had acquired in the mid-1980s. Much of this debt came from his British-based Sky Television satellite network, which incurred massive losses in its early years of operation, which (like many of his business interests) was heavily subsidized with profits from his other holdings until he was able to force rival satellite operator British Satellite Broadcasting to accept a merger on his terms in 1990. (The merged company, BSkyB has dominated the British pay-TV market since).

In 1995, the Fox network became the object of scrutiny from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) when it was alleged that its Australian base made Murdoch's ownership of Fox illegal. The FCC, however, ruled in Murdoch's favor, stating that his ownership of Fox was in the public's best interests. In the same year News Corp announced a deal with MCI Communications to develop a major news website as well as funding a conservative news magazine, The Weekly Standard. In the same year, News Corp launched the Foxtel pay television network in Australia in a partnership with Telstra and Publishing and Broadcasting Limited.

In 1996, Fox established the Fox News Channel, a 24-hour cable news station. Since its launch it has eroded CNN's market share, and it now bills itself as "the most-watched cable news channel." This is due in part to recent ratings studies, released in the fourth quarter of 2004, showing that the network had nine of the top ten programs in the "Cable News" category.

In 1999, News Corp significantly expanded its music holdings in Australia by acquiring the controlling share in a leading Australian independent label, Michael Gudinski's Mushroom Records; he merged the two as Festival Mushroom Records (FMR). Both Festival and FMR were managed by Murdoch's son James Murdoch for several years.

In late 2003, News Corp acquired a 34 percent stake in Hughes Electronics, operator of the largest American satellite TV system, DirecTV, from General Motors for $6 billion (USD).

[edit] Shareholders

As of August 2005 the Murdoch family owns about 29% of the company. Nearly all of these shares are voting shares, and Rupert Murdoch retains effective control of the company. Nonetheless John Malone of Liberty Media has built up a larger stake of 32%, but only around half of these shares are voting shares. Saudi prince Alwaleed bin Talal al Saud who is an investing tycoon and chairman of the Kingdom Holding Company said in an interview with Charlie Rose that he had about a 6-7% stake in News Corp. [1][2].

[edit] Corporate governance

Current members of the board of directors of News Corporation are: Peter Barnes, Chase Carey, Peter Chernin, Kenneth Cowley, David DeVoe, Viet Dinh, Rod Eddington, Andrew Knight, Lachlan Murdoch, Rupert Murdoch (chairman), Rod Paige, Thomas Perkins, Arthur Siskind, Jose Maria Aznar, and John L. Thornton.

[edit] Holdings

[edit] Books

[edit] Newspapers

Bayside Times Flushing Times Fresh Meadows Little Neck Times Jackson Heights Woodside Times Richmond Hill Times Jamaica Times Laurelton times Queens village Astoria Times forest Hills Times

    • Caribbean Life

[edit] Magazines

[edit] Music

[edit] Sports

[edit] Studios

[edit] TV

[edit] Broadcast

[edit] Satellite television

[edit] Cable

[edit] Internet

[edit] Other assets

  • (NDS) - Conditional access technology and personal digital video recorders (PVRs)
  • Broadsystem Ltd (UK) - Telephony provider for media companies, bought in 1991
  • Broadsystem Australia (Australia)
  • Broadsystem Ventures (UK) - provider of cheap-rate telephone calls, particularly for customers of Sky Television. Bought outright in 1999.
  • Jamba! - Mobile Entertainment/Mobile Handsets Personalization/Games. 51% majority stake acquired through deal with VeriSign in September 2006.

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Murdoch's son sees pay doubled ahead of exit"
  2. ^ http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5248387077652418022&q=alwaleed&hl=en

[edit] External links

News Corporation

Corporate Directors: Chairman and Managing Director Rupert Murdoch | Others: Peter Barnes | Chase Carey | Peter Chernin | Kenneth Cowley | David DeVoe | Viet Dinh | Rod Eddington | Andrew Knight | Lachlan Murdoch | Thomas Perkins | Stanley Shuman | Arthur Siskind | John L. Thornton

Misc. Assets: 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment | Fox News Talk | HarperCollins | Fox Interactive Media | MySpace | National Rugby League (50%) | NDS Group | TV Guide
Newspapers: New York Post | News International Group : The Times | The Sunday Times | The Sun | News of the World | thelondonpaper | News Limited (Australian newspapers)
Studios: 20th Century Fox | 20th Century Fox Animation | 20th Century Fox Television | Blue Sky Studios | Fox Atomic | Fox Searchlight Pictures | Fox Faith | Fox Television Studios | Fox Studios Australia | Fox Studios Baja
US Broadcast Television Assets: Fox Broadcasting Company | Fox Television Stations Group | MyNetworkTV
US Cable Television Assets: Fox Movie Channel | Fox News Channel | Fox Reality | Fox Soccer Channel | Fox Sports en Español | Fox Sports Net | Foxnet | FX Networks | FX (UK) | National Geographic Channel (50% with National Geographic) | National Geographic Channel (UK) (50% with National Geographic) | SPEED Channel | SportSouth | TV Guide Channel
International and Satellite Television Assets: BSkyB | bTV | DirecTV Group (39%) | Fox Sports en Latinoamérica | Foxtel | Sky Italia | STAR TV
Fox Television Stations Group: KDFW | KDVR | KMSP | KRIV | KSAZ | KSTU | KTBC | KTTV | KTVI | WAGA | WBRC | WDAF | WFLD | WFXT | WGHP | WHBQ | WITI | WJBK | WJW | WNYW | WOFL | WOGX | WTTG | WTVT | WTXF
MyNetworkTV Owned & Operated Television Stations: KCOP | KDFI | KTXH | KUTP | WDCA | WFTC | WPWR | WRBW | WUTB | WWOR

Annual Revenue: $23.9 billion USD (17% FY 2005) | Employees: 44,000 | Stock Symbol: NYSE: NWS ASX: NWS | Website: www.newscorp.com
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