DMGT underlines new media commitment with merger of digital assets

by Jennifer Whitehead, Brand Republic 03-May-06, 13:30

LONDON - The Daily Mail & General Trust has reflected the growing importance of new media to its operations by merging Associated New Ventures with Northcliffe Electronic Publishing to create a digital powerhouse.

The new division will be known as Associated Northcliffe Digital, and is to be headed by Andrew Hart, the managing director of Associated New Media. He continues to report to Kevin Beatty, managing director of Associated Newspapers.

AN Digital will comprise three divisions: newspaper companion sites, including the Mail online and This is London; digital publishing ventures, including This is Travel and This is Money; and digital classified sites, such as Primelocation and Jobsite.

The restructure follows the merger of the newspaper assets of regional operation Northcliffe and Associated in March to form a single newspaper division, headed by Beatty. That merger came about after DMGT called off its £1.5bn sell-off of Northcliffe after disappointing offers.

Lord Rothermere, chairman of DMGT, said: "Digital is a vital component of DMGT's future. By bringing together the excellent products and teams we have locally and nationally with those of our recently acquired companies, we will be able to provide more effective solutions for advertisers and roll out new products for our customers faster and more consistently across our network."

A spokesperson for DMGT said that the company did not know about redundancies at this stage.

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