Bloomberg, UTV tie up to form Bloomberg UTV

Bloomberg UTV will be the new name for the channel partnership of Bloomberg Television and UTV Multimedia.

Bloomberg TV is a worldwide leader in business news, while UTVi, the business news channel from UTV is a laggard in the Indian business news channel space with about 10% market share.

Bloomberg was earlier reported to be in talks with NDTV Profit, another business news channel in India. A press release issued by Bloomberg said that Bloomberg UTV will provide what it called “unsurpassed real-time business, economic and political news to households across India.”

Bloomberg and UTV did not specify whether Bloomberg UTV will be merely a content and distribution sharing partnership, or whether the news channel deal has an investment angle too. According to rules regarding foreign news companies, joint venture news companies – both print and television – can have a maximum of 24% equity holding by the foreign company. The balance 76% stake must remain with Indian promoters.

Bloomberg TV is owned by Bloomberg LP, the New York-based business news conglomerate. Apart from providing business data through its twin-screen Bloomberg terminals, Bloomberg also operates a news wire service, and publishes Bloomberg Markets. The company is owned by Michael Bloomberg, currently the mayor of New York City.

A Bloomberg press release in PR Newswire attributed “remarkable breadth and depth of reporting for the Indian market” for UTV. However, UTVi commands barely 10% share of the all-India business news channel market. ET Now, promoted by Bennett, Coleman and CO Ltd (Which also publishes Times of India and Economic Times) has 11%, while NDTV Profit has 22%. The market leader of the business news channel segment is CNBC TV18 which has 58%.

BCCL already has a content tie-up with Reuters for Times Now and ET Now. TV-18 partners CNBC, while UTVi already has a a financial investor in Walt Disney Co. NDTV Profit doesnt have any similar content partnership. It is not clear if Bloomberg will buy an equity stake in UTV, since it already has a financial partnership with UTVi, the business channel from UTV was started by Ronnie Screwvalla, a Mumbai-based entrepreneur.

Bloomberg TV has an international audience of about 200 million households. With its content now coming to UTVi, the audience expands by 30 million Indian viewers.

Business channel mindscape in India has been dominated for long by CNBC-TV18, the news channel from Raghav Bahl’s TV-18. It was joined by NDTV Profit, which has failed to make a major dent. A couple of years back, UTVi was launched. This year, the latest aspirant ET Now has entered the scene.

It is estimated that in India, 15 million televisions are added every year, which makes business channel space in India an attractive proposition for Bloomberg.

Bloomberg seems to be in an overdrive to expand. The company hired Andy Lack to look after its multimedia business in June. As recently as yesterday, the Wall Street Journal reported that the company is bidding to buy Business Week, the weekly business news magazine published by McGraw Hill group.

Said Andy Lack, CEO of Bloomberg’s Multimedia group. “By working with UTV to realize our shared vision for business and financial television, Bloomberg renews its commitment to delivering business, economic and political news and analysis to viewers in India, and at the same time to delivering news about one of the world’s most dynamic economies to investors across the globe.”