Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd.
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Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd. is the largest media group in India, owned by the Sahu Jain family, also known as The Times Group. It is best known as the publisher of English daily The Times of India. This company, along with its other group companies, are more popularly known as The Times Group, which also publish The Economic Times (a leading financial broadsheet), Mumbai Mirror, Bangalore Mirror, the Navbharat Times (a Hindi daily broadsheet), Sandhya Times, and the Maharashtra Times (a Marathi daily broadsheet).
It publishes general interest magazines like Femina and Filmfare.
The Times Group has very recently added TIMES NOW a 24-hour English news channel to its chain of news organisations. TIMES NOW is a collaboration between Times Group and Reuters.
It owns Radio Mirchi, a popular FM Radio brand in India and Indiatimes, a popular Indian portal. It also launched a real-estate speciality portal MagicBricks that brings property buyers and sellers (for both land & various types of constructions) onto a same collaboration platform. It also has a job portal called "Timesjobs" and a matrimonial portal called "Simplymarry". It has recently introduced a new venture called goodlife world, where all the products of BCCL comes under one roof.
Bennett Coleman & Co. Ltd. has an open programme whereby it enters into pacts/agreements with approximately 100-odd companies (www.privatetreaties.com). Under the pact, which is called a Private Treaty, Bennett Coleman & Co. Ltd. buys shares of small and fast-growing companies in return for guaranteed advertising and, quite obviously, favourable coverage in the Times publications. Some analysts point out that private treaty is a good way for companies or individuals to escape negative publicity from the Times group publications.
Bennett Coleman & Co. Ltd. has also, of late, been acquiring equity interests in a number of Indian companies, from real estate to online brokerage. For a publishing group that owns two of the largest selling English medium dailies in the world, namely ‘The Times of India’ and ‘Economic Times’, the acquisition of equity stakes in companies and the ‘private treaty’ arrangement has often lead to question marks as to the editorial quality and integrity of its publications.
Provided below is an indicative list of companies in which BCCL has made significant equity investments:
Abbee Consumables And Peripherals Sshope Ltd.
Ace Tours Worldwide Private Limited
Almondz Capital & Management Services Ltd
Almondz Global Securities Ltd
Archies Ltd.
Asia CRYO-CELL Private Limited
Avestha Gengraine Technologies Pvt Ltd.
Bajaj Hindusthan Sugar & Industries Ltd.
Career Forum Ltd.
Cosmo Aviation Training School
Emaar MGF Land Limited
Ensemble Infrastructure India Limited
eYantra Industries
ICRI Research (P) Ltd.
India Infoline Ltd.
KSL and Industries Ltd.
Leisure & Lifestyle Information Services Pvt. Ltd.
Liberty Whiteware Pvt Ltd.
Lok Housing & Constructions Ltd.
NEXT Link Pvt Ltd.
Nik-Nish Retail Pvt., Ltd.
Pantaloon Retail (India) Ltd.
Refex Refrigerants Ltd.
Sahara One Media and Entertainment Ltd.
Sai InfoSystems India Pvt. Ltd.
SatNav Technologies (P) Ltd.
Sleep-ins Apparels Pvt., Ltd.
SMC Global Securities Ltd.
Timbor Home Pvt Ltd.
Travel Masti Holidays Private Ltd.
Utssav CZ Gold Jewels
Worldwide Media Ltd.
YOU Telecom India Pvt Ltd.
