7
Media Stakeholders Outside the United States
Although some global media systems such as CNN, the BBC, Disney, and News Corporation come to mind as high‐profile stakeholders in the global media world, there are clearly other major players. This chapter identifies the major global media stakeholders outside the United States and describes their various communication interests.
Although the United States frequently attracts substantial criticism for exporting a culture of Hollywood sex and violence, and for largely dominating music videos, television, and theater screens around the world, some of the major global enterprises, such as Sony, Vivendi, Bertelsmann, and others, are foreign‐owned multimedia corporations. Not only are they foreign‐owned, but some of their holdings include American media businesses, or this has been the case in the past.
Japan's Sony Corporation, for example, controls Columbia Pictures. Random House is an American book publisher which is a part of Penguin Random House, owned by Germany's Bertelsmann. France's Lagardère retained sole control over Elle, Car and Driver, and other magazines until its international magazine business was sold to American‐based Hearst in 2011. Lagardère retains control over its magazines in France only, and of the Elle trademark internationally.1
French‐based Vivendi controls Universal Music Group and formerly owned video game maker Activision Blizzard. Vivendi is now, however, merely a minority shareholder in Activision Blizzard, since the company bought shares back from Vivendi in 2013 for nearly $6 billion.2 This chapter describes these global media conglomerates and others.
Cultural Imperialism
In the 1960s and 1970s, critical scholars produced a body of literature on the subject of cultural imperialism.3 These scholars condemned the role of the United States in global media expansion. Some of this criticism found its way into the rhetoric of UNESCO in the 1980s and continues to be repeated by people promoting an anti‐American agenda. The agenda seeks to reignite the support for NWICO and to promote a more equitable and balanced flow of media in the international arena.
Without going into detail about the origins of cultural imperialism, it is worth noting that there is simply no monolithic US global media empire. Although a global media empire does exist, the media corporations involved tend to be based in various core nations. They work in different languages, with different interests and strategies, rather than promoting a simplistic New York–Los Angeles plot to capture the minds of unsuspecting foreigners.
From music streaming, to movies, magazines, television, and social media, there is a great global mix of ownership among the current major multimedia stakeholders. This globalization and consolidation of the communications industry is going to increase and expand over time. About the only common denominator of the several far‐flung global stakeholders is the desire to make a profit by expanding their audience size or share. They seek more customers to generate greater profits in order to keep their respective senior management, owners, and shareholders happy. All are looking at emerging markets for future growth.
Concerns about the possible effects of the mass media on individuals and cultures have been a preoccupation of academics since World War II. Much of the research focused on the impact of the media on developed core nations, particularly the United States, Canada, and Europe.4 But a small number of critical scholars began to examine the impact of the media on the less‐developed peripheral nations and examined issues such as power, domination, economic determinism, and other variables.5 The “Made in America” label began to take on different meanings to different researchers.
But it was Herbert I. Schiller who focused in a theoretical way on issues such as global ownership, one‐way flow of information, power, cultural aspects, and the impact of advertising.6 Schiller studied the ways in which core‐based media industries were having a deleterious effect on indigenous industries in peripheral and semiperipheral countries, as well as how these industries were drawing economic resources, such as box‐office revenues, from both industrialized and non‐industrialized nations around the world for the financial benefit of Hollywood or New York.
In the 1970s the literature on cultural imperialism began to look at other media systems as well, from music recordings, video games, and television, to advertising and children's paraphernalia, particularly Disney products and parks. There was growing criticism and documentation of US media giants by a small cadre of critical scholars.
But in 1988 many of these scholars were taken aback when Japan's Sony Corporation paid $5 billion to acquire Columbia Pictures. The Hollywood film landscape began to change dramatically as this merger was rapidly followed by other US companies being bought by foreign corporations as part of the expanding global economy. Many of these transactions and the foreign stakeholders involved are detailed later in this chapter.
The significant point here is that although the theory of cultural imperialism was gaining credence as a negative model of global relationships, Sony's deal forced scholars to rethink the question of who owns what and for whom. The problem became a transnational issue rather than a purely Hollywood or “Made in America” one, as critics had contended for decades. The literature and momentum of critical scholars became stale and lost their spark during the 1990s as major foreign media corporations changed the global media landscape.
At one point in the 1970s, the United States dominated the global media system to an extent it has not done before or since. Beginning in the 1980s, with the takeover of some Hollywood studios by foreign corporations; the move of British, German, French, and Canadian companies into global cultural industries; and the entrance of the then Australian‐based News Corporation into television and satellite businesses in North America, Europe, and Asia, a highly competitive global media marketplace began to develop. It functions to maximize profits from various global profit centers with little regard for national concerns, culture, language, or academic critics, except when they interfere with the economic goals of these far‐flung media empires.
More recently, some scholars have produced a body of literature criticizing the notion of cultural imperialism through the media, while others insist that it is still a relevant concept.7 A major point of criticism directed against the earlier cultural imperialism approach is that it appeared to be based, at least in part, on an unconscious research bias based on a US‐centric viewpoint. In other words, the charge is that because US media entities were assumed to dominate in other parts of the world, and because it was assumed that global audiences were clamoring for US media products, American dominance was read into the equation wherever possible.
Some evidence suggests a research shift from an emphasis on media imperialism around the 1960s through the 1980s to a later acknowledgement of some degree of cultural pluralism or diversity in media. An emphasis on what the European Commission terms “pluralism” is at the heart of recent attempts to create a diverse, yet united, system of media in Europe, as outlined in Chapter 8.
In recent years, some scholars have emphasized cultural pluralism in media, which has led to a debate over whether the current state of global media is characterized by homogenization or heterogenization.8 In other words, does media content on a global scale tend to exhibit sameness, or does it reflect cultural diversity?
On the other hand, heterogenization, the view that media content is characterized by anything but sameness, is a view which has been criticized for ignoring persistent global power structures. In fact, it is the presence of continually dominating forces in the world economy and in global media which has resulted in new buzzwords to describe the impact of those power structures. The result has been the emergence of such new media‐related terminology as Cocacolonization, cultural cringe, conglomerization, and glocalization.
Cultural cringe, in particular, is a philosophical concept which suggests that individuals associated with some world cultures are so plagued by an internalized inferiority complex about their culture that they readily accept media domination by more developed nations. Cultural cringe is seen as a lingering vestige of a colonial mentality brought on by media domination by the world's most prominent media‐enriched countries.
Cocacolonization, a term which is based, of course, on Coca‐Cola and colonization, is a tongue‐in‐cheek term designed to describe American global dominance through a pervasive worldwide culture of capitalism. The term conglomerization, of course, refers to a trend toward corporate mergers, a trend which has been pervasive and, at times, extreme, over the last several decades.
The prevalence of such terms in public discussion about world media suggests a lingering concern over elements of some form of media imperialism. Glocalization, on the other hand, is a term formed from both “global” and “local.” As applied to the media, the term suggests that world media may be characterized by elements which are, at once, both global and local in nature. This may explain, in part, the prevalence of localized versions of “foreign” TV programs, such as programs designed for the Arab world but patterned after such US fare as American Idol.9
The following sections document the extensive penetration of Europe, Japan, and other countries into US and global markets by virtue of their investments in a broad range of cultural products that are made and primarily consumed in the United States. A model example of this is News Corporation, formerly based and incorporated in Australia, but which received 75% of its revenues and profits from operations in the United States. Reincorporating in the United States was a logical move for News Corp. All giant foreign media corporations are in direct and daily competition with US giants such as Time Warner, Viacom, Comcast–NBCUniversal, and Disney.
The United States of Europe
Europe's television, movie, music, cable, and satellite industries are experiencing an unprecedented frenzy of consolidation. On an official level, the 28 European Union (EU) nations are attempting to function as a collective entity rather than as individual nations when it comes to international media as well as other areas. The concept of a United States of Europe (USE) has been suggested to describe this stance. In actual practice, however, some disparities still exist, especially when it comes to implementing European Commission policies regarding the media in the former communist nations of Eastern and Central Europe. While this is being written, the UK is actively engaged in backtracking from its EU involvement through the so‐called “Brexit” (British exit) process. Still, to the extent possible, the EU is constructing trans‐European communication policies with wide‐ranging ramifications.
At the same time, Turkey was expected to become a full‐fledged part of the EU, following its application process which began in 2005. That process was based on earlier negotiations and expectations dating as far back as 1987. Most of Turkey's land mass is situated in Asia, but the bulk of its most populous city, Istanbul, is in Europe.
The admission of Turkey, with its highly vibrant entertainment media system, into the EU could have served as a vital link between Europe and the rest of the Muslim world. Those negotiations broke down completely, however, as a result of the rise to power of President Recep Erdogan, who was responsible for extensive media purges in Turkey. The country's membership application was formally suspended by the European Parliament in April of 2017.10
Historically, the origins of the USE can be traced to the period immediately after World War II. In 1951 the European Coal and Steel Community was established under French leadership. The six members were Belgium, West Germany, Luxembourg, France, Italy, and the Netherlands. The agreement reduced barriers hindering cooperation and encouraged joint ventures in the two strategic industries, coal and steel.
The idea was such a great success that the six countries decided to expand the concept to other sectors. They did so and created a “common market,” free of trade barriers and tariffs, with the 1957 Treaty of Rome. Institutions, laws, regulations, policies, strategic planning, and in 2002 a new currency, the euro, were designed to create a single seamless market leading to the USE. This standardization and consolidation also impacted their cultural industries, or as Europeans tend to refer to them, audiovisual industries. Today the USE stands at 28 member nations with eight more nations seeking admission. In 2004 alone, 10 new members, mostly former Soviet‐dominated countries, joined the union, followed by Bulgaria and Romania in 2007. The current population of the USE is larger than that of the United States.
Considering that prior to 1980 the majority of European television and cable systems were either strictly government‐controlled or government‐owned, the recent merger mania is new to the European communications industry. With liberalization and deregulation in the 1980s came a substantial wave of privatization of radio, television, and cable systems across Europe, as well as the addition of several new commercial channels.
This was encouraged by the growth in popularity of such commercial services as Radio Luxembourg and offshore pirate radio stations. A third wave of activity is now taking place in which transnational communication corporations are becoming larger and larger as they purchase smaller systems across Europe, as they start entirely new channels or networks, or as they buy foreign multimedia outlets, prompting some critics to call these countries collectively the “United States of Europe” (Table 7.1).
Table 7.1 Ten of the most prominent European‐based media companies.
Source: Based on a comparison of multiple sources; cf. http://www.businessinsider.com/the‐30‐biggest‐media‐owners‐in‐the‐world‐2016‐5/#30‐time‐inc‐‐287‐billion‐in‐media‐revenue‐1; and http://www.hackers.media/home/2016/10/14/the‐top‐10‐european‐media‐companies‐how‐they‐compare‐in‐revenue‐cash‐and‐geography, accessed August 3, 2018.
| Bertelsmann |
| Sky |
| Vivendi |
| RELX |
| Lagardère |
| Mediaset |
| ITV |
| ProSiebenSat.1 |
| Axel Springer |
| Hubert Burda |
The motivation for this activity is straightforward. John Tagliabue puts it this way:
What is causing this frenzy of reorganization? Mainly, the global economy, which is forcing Europe's relatively small players to join forces to cover the costs of switching to digital and pay per view TV and of marketing integrated bundles of television, telephone and Internet services.11
These combined and larger media companies are in a better competitive position because they can offer a larger audience to advertisers, or a larger number of cable subscribers, to generate the revenues necessary to upgrade cable systems to make them Internet‐ready.
A related phenomenon in the USE is that more commercial corporations are designing advertising and programs for a pan‐European audience. Advertisers want to deal with major trans‐European broadcasters for a single package rather than with small individual media outlets on a city‐by‐city or country‐by‐country basis.
Traditionally, broadcast media options in the United States have been dominated by the traditional full‐service broadcast TV networks, such as NBC and CBS, as well as major cable/satellite networks like HBO, CNN, and MTV. Shifts in technology have, however, resulted in shifts in audience behavior, with an accompanying rise in the importance of such digitally focused media entities as Netflix and YouTube, the latter owned by Google. Such shifts can be expected to alter the European media landscape as well, in spite of the fact that Europe currently depends primarily on DTT (digital terrestrial television) systems in contrast to the American fixation with cable TV.
In Europe there will be major new conglomerates, created through the consolidation of smaller national‐based systems that are reaching out to a pan‐European audience. Many European communication corporations realize that they need to engage in pan‐European merger activities or they will be purchased by some other major stakeholder, or be left behind altogether. If they do not expand, they will end up with smaller audiences and reduced revenues in an era when production costs and competition for both European and US television series and movies continue to escalate. At the same time, any moves toward the formation of major new European players must be pitted against attempts by major American players, such as Netflix, to establish a major presence in Europe.
Seen through the lens of world system theory, communication corporations tend to be based in core nations like the United States. These nations exhibit similar traits that make them highly competitive: a high gross national product (GNP), heavy deployment of information technologies, and a sophisticated and well‐educated labor force. These European core nations are also expanding as rapidly as possible into other core, as well as semiperipheral, nations.
Geographically, they have an advantage because many of the semiperipheral nations are adjacent to the European community. Peripheral nations around the globe are, in many cases, former colonies of European nations. On the one hand, this may give the USE an advantage in marketing their communication products and systems to peripheral nations. On the other hand, deep‐seated antagonism and a legacy of hostility between the colonies and their former European masters might prevent some peripheral nations from doing business with their former colonizers.
A final point is that in the United States’ cultural industries and their products are viewed as economic entities, but across Europe and elsewhere these same industries are viewed through a very different prism. Cultural industries or audiovisual industries are regarded as part of European culture, history, and artistic heritage. Europeans are much more concerned with their language, culture, and employment opportunities in media industries, and with preserving their history, and do not regard media productions as being economic products like cornflakes, apples, lumber, or cars.
This is reflected in the many public policies on, as well as significant financial subsidies for, cultural activities that are promoted and encouraged in European nations. The USE is concerned about the cultural homogenization of media industries if they follow a US formula and model. The leadership of the cultural sectors across Europe is assigned to various ministers of culture, which is a high‐ranking cabinet post in almost all nations. Here is an example to illustrate this important point.
The European Union provides specific grants to stimulate the development and distribution of European media productions. The goal is to increase quality and make available trans‐European films and television programs across five genres or formats: fiction for television and cinema, movies, documentaries, animation, and new media.
The European Union also provides financial backing for European media production as a part of the EU's MEDIA Program (sometimes referred to as the MEDIA Sub‐Program of Creative Europe), formerly known as Media Plus. The program has sought to enhance the development, distribution, and promotion of European media products, including feature films, documentaries, animation, and TV programs.
At the 2017 Cannes International Film Festival, 20 films were shown which had been co‐financed by the MEDIA Program. Those films had received a total of 1.6 million euros from Creative Europe.12 The goal is to push a trans‐European perspective onto global screens of all sizes. The hope is to compete with Hollywood for eyes as well as revenue.
The European Audiovisual Observatory was established by the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, France, in 1992 as a public service organization. Its purpose is to monitor the progress of Europe's media industries, often referred to in European Commission jargon as “audiovisual” industries. As the organization describes its mission,
The Observatory was created in 1992 in order to collect and distribute information about the audiovisual industries in Europe. By making this information available, the Observatory aims at promoting greater transparency and a clearer understanding of the ways in which the audiovisual industries in Europe function, both from an economic and legal point of view.13
Basically the EU is trying to create a pan‐European effort for several reasons: (1) to enhance the viability of European media in the world market; (2) to maximize access to all European media across national boundaries in Europe; and (3) to stem the growing threat of becoming an electronic colony of US media empires. The EU wants the audiovisual talent and media profits to remain in European hands.
The latter is especially of concern as media systems transition largely to digital, web‐based forms for which US companies like Netflix are currently better positioned to service and to champion. Despite US competition, 28% of films televised in Europe in 2017 were produced in Europe, according to Observatory findings. Publicly funded TV channels scheduled more European movies than commercial TV channels. On public channels, the percentage of films which were produced in Europe was 44% throughout the day, compared to 39% during prime time. In addition, the Observatory found that films produced in Ireland, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, and the UK were shown on European TV outside of their countries of production more often than within those countries.14
The audiovisual sector is one of the fastest‐growing areas of the European economy and a leading global market. The internationalization and integration of what were previously mostly national media landscapes, boosted by rapid technical progress, mean that the audiovisual sector now stands out above other branches of the economy.15
In general, European leaders are well aware of the significance of developing supportive public policies as well as of financial incentives in order to have major stakeholders in an audiovisual sector that can compete on the world stage, primarily against American players.
Major Europe‐Based Stakeholders
Axel Springer (Germany)
As one of the largest media companies in Europe, Axel Springer, based in Berlin, is Germany's largest print‐media publisher and Europe's largest digital publishing house. Axel Springer's holdings include magazines, newspapers, TV stations and channels, radio stations, and web‐based options which operate in 35 countries.
The company began in 1946 in Hamburg, Germany, when its founder, Axel Springer, began a publishing company. Axel Springer is now emphasizing digital publishing, with classifieds and marketing as its two primary areas of strength.
Axel Springer publishes a number of magazines in both print and digital form. Some of their titles, such as Maxim, Playboy, and Forbes, are licensed editions designed for specific countries in Europe and elsewhere. Axel Springer is responsible for the major German daily newspapers Die Welt, B.Z., and Bild.
Bertelsmann (Germany)
The German‐based Bertelsmann group of companies has a strong media presence in about 50 countries worldwide. It is the seventh‐largest media company globally. Bertelsmann calls itself “the company with the most diverse range of media content in the world.”16
Carl Bertelsmann established the company in 1835 as a religious publishing house. While it remains a private company, it now has five major operating units worldwide and a revenue in the billions. Its interests lie in newspapers, magazines, print, print distribution, broadcasting, and music rights management, as well as various media investments. Major divisions of Bertelsmann include the following:
- RTL Group (broadcasting)
- Penguin Random House (book publishing)
- Gruner + Jahr (G + J) (magazine publishing)
- BMG (music publishing)
- Arvato (business process outsourcing [BPO] services for business‐to‐business [B2B] clients)
- Bertelsmann Printing Group (high‐volume printing)
- Bertelsmann Education (web‐based instruction)
- Bertelsmann Investments (investments in startups)
RTL Group
Bertelsmann owns the majority of the shares of RTL Group. RTL Group, headquartered in the tiny nation of Luxembourg, is regarded as Europe's largest broadcaster and one of the world's leading media content producers. This division of Bertelsmann maintains holdings in 60 TV channels and 31 radio stations, in addition to production companies in various countries.
RTL Group was formed from the legacy of Radio Luxembourg and the resultant RTL brand. Radio Luxembourg first took to the airwaves in 1924. The station was, at one time, a major commercial broadcaster based in Luxembourg and heard across much of Europe in multiple languages. Radio Luxembourg offered pop and rock music at a time when publicly funded state services in various European nations resisted airing such material. In that manner, Radio Luxembourg exerted a powerful influence for change in European media generally, between the 1960s and the 1980s.
The present company was established through the 2001 merger of CLT‐UFA, Pearson TV, and Audiofina. Bertelsmann has been the majority shareholder in RTL Group since 2001, with over a 90% share. After an initial public offering (IPO) in 2014, Bertelsmann still owned slightly more than 75% of RTL.
RTL Group includes RTL channels in the Benelux countries (Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg), Croatia, Hungary, Spain, and Southeast Asia. RTL Group entered into a joint venture in 2013 with CBS to create new Southeast Asian TV networks under the banner RTL CBS Entertainment Network. This endeavor was expanded to the Philippines in 2015.
The company operates various popular TV channels accessible in Europe, including RTL Television, Super RTL, and others, along with Vox in Germany and M6 in France. RTL Group's radio operations in France have been recently reorganized into what is now known as Groupe M6. RTL Group has also become Europe's leading online video producer, with more than 230 YouTube channels as well as several multichannel online networks.
In addition, RTL Group's radio stations are among the most popular in Europe. The company's production arm, Fremantle Media, is a major force in European media, producing about 9,200 hours of programming a year in 62 countries. Fremantle Media is termed the “largest independent TV distribution company outside the US.”17
Fremantle Media was responsible for the American Gods TV series, available in the US through the Starz network and available through Amazon Prime. ABC announced an agreement in 2017 with Fremantle Media to revive the American Idol TV series. A Fremantle subsidiary, known as Fremantle Media North America, is based in Los Angeles. Fremantle Media is also the holding company for the German production activities of the 100‐year‐old historically significant film producer UFA, short for Universum Film‐Aktien.
Digital subsidiaries of RTL Group include SpotX, based in Denver, Broadband TV (Vancouver), StyleHaul (Los Angeles), and Divimove (Berlin). RTL Group has been expanding into virtual reality for mobile devices and stand‐alone VR devices, through collaboration with the Israel‐based company Inception.
The Vox channel in Germany experienced a rocky history, with major financial losses in the early 1990s. The channel acquired new owners in 1994, one of them being Bertelsmann with a nearly 25% share. By the late 1990s, the channel began to increase its audience size, largely by scheduling popular content imported from the US. This followed a 1998 deal with 20th Century Fox. The channel operates in a symbiotic relationship with its sister channel in Germany, RTL Television.
Currently, RTL Group operates several German channels, RTL Television, Vox, RTL II, Super RTL, RTL Nitro, and N‐TV, the latter being a news channel. RTL continues to schedule imports from the US, such as The Blacklist and CSI, while including German‐produced programs as well. Recent programs in the latter category include a German program inspired by the American Idol format (Deutschland Sucht den Superstar, which literally translates as Germany Searches for a Superstar), as well as a German imitation of the BBC's Strictly Come Dancing.
RTL Group's reorganization of its French broadcasting activities into Groupe M6 is intended to better compete in the realm of digital media.18 Formation of Groupe M6 was largely based on the commercial TV channel known as M6, but includes 11 other channels as well as radio stations. RTL Group owns a controlling share of over 48%.
Penguin Random House
Bertelsmann is the majority shareholder in Penguin Random House, the world's largest trade book publisher. Bertelsmann and Pearson jointly formed the company in 2013. The formation of Penguin Random House is based on two major and historically significant publishers: Penguin, originally based in the UK, and Random House, originally based in the US. The company publishers under almost 250 separate publisher names, known as “imprints,” including two which began in the US, Doubleday and Alfred A. Knopf.
Penguin Random House is often referred to simply as Random House. The company sells nearly 800 million books, audiobooks, and ebooks yearly around the world.19
Gruner + Jahr
Bertelsmann's interests in magazine publishing, both in print and in digital form, are carried out through its Gruner + Jahr (G + J) subsidiary. In 2014, Bertelsmann acquired 100% ownership of Gruner + Jahr, which is one of Europe's largest publishing companies, headquartered in Hamburg, Germany. G + J publishes over 500 magazines and digital products in 22 countries. G + J refers to Germany and France as its “core markets.”20 Its titles include National Geographic, GEO, and such high‐profile European magazines as Stern and Brigitte.
BMG
BMG, short for Bertelsmann Music Group, was established by Bertelsmann in 1987 after it acquired RCA Records. In 2008 the majority of its assets were sold to Sony, and then an American investment firm bought a controlling share. In 2013, however, Bertelsmann acquired all shares. BMG handles over a million music rights, as the fourth‐largest music publisher. BMG also controls the catalogs of such music publishers as Chrysalis and Virgin, and has offices in what the company calls “eleven core music markets.”21
European Broadcasting Union
The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) is a significant transnational entity for public broadcasters across Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. Given that large and successful non‐commercial (i.e., public service) broadcasters have operated in almost all nations outside the United States since 1950, the EBU has been a crucial professional association of national, non‐commercial broadcasters. Working in 56 countries, the EBU operates Eurovision and Euroradio networks. It also facilitates the exchange of programming and negotiates broadcasting rights for major sports events, such as soccer matches and the Olympics. The EBU also works to facilitate original co‐productions between member broadcasters.
The EBU issued its Madrid Declaration in 2005. The five main issues covered by the Declaration are:
- the major role played by public service broadcasters to further European integration;
- a proactive approach on the part of the EBU and its members to support public services;
- the need for public service broadcasting to be at the forefront of new initiatives regarding digital terrestrial broadcasting;
- a comprehensive delivery of public service content on the full spectrum of new digitalplatforms; and
- the crucial importance of guaranteed stable and long‐term funding to allow the fullimplementation of public service duties.22
Finally, the EBU monitors the proposed actions of the World Trade Organization (WTO) as they impact the public broadcasting sectors. The EBU does not view broadcasting as a commercial commodity to be included in WTO's free trade undertakings. The WTO and its move into the media and cultural sectors are discussed in Chapter 4.
Hubert Burda Media (Germany)
Hubert Burda Media, headquartered in Offenburg, Germany, is a major technology and media company with diverse activities in such areas as magazine publishing, radio and tV broadcasting, and web‐based activities. The company is perhaps best known for publishing 93 magazines in Germany, as well as 320 international titles. The company also owns TV and radio operations, in addition to mail‐order companies and marketing firms. Hubert Burda produces about 540 worldwide media products.
The company is headed by Hubert Burda, described as a “publishing baron” and a celebrity in his own right who enjoys associating with the socially prominent.23 One of the company's more prominent brands is BurdaStyle, aimed at women. Some of the company's ventures involving BurdaStyle have been conducted jointly with American companies, including Hearst and F + W.
ITV (UK)
Commercial television did not exist in the UK until after passage of the Television Act of 1954. ITV began in the UK in 1955 as Independent Television, and was authorized by the Independent Television Authority to provide a commercial alternative to the license fee‐supported BBC. ITV calls itself the largest “commercial family of channels in the UK.”24 ITV programs are sold to various other countries.
The ITV operates multiple free‐to‐air channels in the UK, using DTT systems and over‐the‐top (OTT) web streaming devices. HDTV versions are also transmitted by such pay platforms as Sky or Virgin. A partnership with the BBC resulted in a subscription video‐on‐demand (SVOD) service called Britbox, which launched in the US in 2017. Britbox provides American audiences with programming from both ITV and the BBC on a streaming basis, by means of a mobile device, computer, or such OTT devices as Roku or Apple TV.
In 2017 it was announced that Amazon Prime subscribers in Germany and the UK would have access to various live and on‐demand video options, including programming from ITV, Discovery, and Eurosport.25
Lagardère (France)
Lagardère is an extremely diversified French‐based conglomerate involved in media publishing, production, broadcasting, and distribution. Lagardère grew out of a World War II‐era defense supplier known as Matra, short for Mécanique Aviation Traction. Its CEO came to head the popular France‐based Europe 1 radio network in 1974.
In 1980, Matra acquired the Hachette publishing group, with involvement in books, magazines, and newspapers. That year, the French government acquired a 51% interest in Matra, but excluding its Hachette holdings. Europe 1 was then sold to the French government, but Hachette regained control in 1986. Matra became privatized in 1988.
Hachette and Matra merged in 1992 and became Matra‐Hachette. A new umbrella company was then formed, called Lagardère Groupe, and later simply Lagardère. The company acquired part of Vivendi's assets in France and Spain in 2004, then reorganized three years later to operate within four divisions: (1) Lagardére Publishing, which produces books and ebooks; (2) Lagardére Travel Retail, which supplies such items as travel essentials and travel‐related food services; (3) Lagardére Active, which is involved in media and advertising; and (4) Lagardére Sports and Entertainment, which is concerned with such areas as concerts, sports events, stadiums, and related sponsorship.
Lagardère became one of the first global marketers by promoting the Elle Channel with Parisian cosmetic firm Estée Lauder's cosmetic brand Clinique. The Lagardère Active division operates 26 radio stations, 17 TV channels, and calls itself “the number one audiovisual production company in France and Spain.”26
The Lagardère Group sold its international magazine operations in 2011, but currently publishes 13 titles in France and another 80 under license in the rest of the world. Recognizable Lagardére brands include Elle and Paris Match magazines, Virgin Radio, and publishers Hachette, Larousse, and Hodder & Stoughton. In recent years the company acquired publisher Perseus Books as well as Grupo Boomerang TV, based in Spain. In 2014, Lagardère made arrangements with Amazon to market Hachette books, in both print and ebook form, in the US.
Mediaset (Italy)
Gruppo Mediaset, better known as simply Mediaset, is an Italian‐based media company and the largest commercial broadcaster in Italy. Mediaset also holds a controlling interest in MEC, which is Spain's largest TV network.
The company traces its history back to 1978, with the formation of a local TV station, Telemilano. By 1980, the company was broadcasting throughout Italy as Canale 5. This provided the foundation for Mediaset, which was formed in 1987 by Silvio Berlusconi, who had been prime minister of Italy. Mediaset expanded into Spain in 1997 after acquiring a 25% interest in the commercial broadcaster Telecinco.
Mediaset operates three free‐to‐air commercial TV networks in Italy: Canale 5, Italia 1, and Retequattro. Through its Spanish subsidiary, MediasetEspaña, Mediaset owns two free‐to‐air networks in Spain, Telecinco and Cuatro. The company also offers free theme‐based channels in addition to pay TV options, including video on demand (VOD) and pay‐per‐view (PPV) services. The company also was responsible for producing over 16,000 hours of programming in 2016 alone. Mediaset also operates radio services.
In 1997 Mediaset acquired Italian broadcasting rights for all NBC movies and miniseries. In 2004 it began a 24‐hour commercial children's channel, named Boing, in partnership with Time Warner, and in 2011 launched Cartoonito as a joint venture between Mediaset and the European subsidiary of US‐based Turner Broadcasting. Cartoonito is one of Mediaset's theme‐based channels, and is aimed at pre‐school children.
Dutch‐based media company Endemol Shine was 25% owned by public investors as of 2005. The remaining 75% was purchased in 2007 by a consortium led by Mediaset. Endemol Shine Group is a producer and distributor, with program formats being sold internationally. In the US, this has resulted in the production, through Endemol USA in Los Angeles, of such programs as Fear Factor, Deal or No Deal, and Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.
Mediaset has expanded rapidly into web‐based delivery, in addition to using broadcast, satellite, and DTT. The company also jointly produces major productions for the international market. Mediaset also controls the top Italian advertising agency Publitalia.
Pearson (UK)
Pearson, based in the UK, has experienced difficulties in recent years, and laid off 10% of its workforce in 2014. The company had published two of the world's most significant periodicals, the newspaper Financial Times and the magazine The Economist. The following year, the company sold its FT Group, including the Financial Times, to Japan‐based Nihon Keizai Shinbun, better known as the Nikkei. Pearson also sold its 50% ownership of The Economist, which is now in the hands of several family interests and individual shareholders.
Pearson then entered into negotiations with Bertelsmann in 2013 regarding the two companies' respective publishing arms, Penguin Group and Random House. The result was the formation of Penguin Random House, with Bertelsmann controlling 53% of the joint venture, and Pearson the remainder. In 2015, Pearson was rebranded, with a total focus on education. Further work staff cuts were made in 2017.
ProSiebenSat.1 (Germany)
German‐based ProSiebenSat.1 is one of Europe's most prominent media companies, with Germany its most significant revenue market. The company emphasizes advertising‐supported free‐to‐air TV, but operates pay TV channels as well, in addition to radio stations and print media businesses. ProSiebenSat.1 operates several HDTV channels as well as web‐streaming options through its Maxdome platform and 7TV app.
The company was formed in 2000 from the merger of ProSieben and Sat.1. Axel Springer, already discussed, holds a 12% share of ProSiebenSat.1 and attempted to buy the company in 2005. The move was blocked by European regulators, however. Axel Springer then divested its holdings in the company in 2007.
In that same year, ProSiebenSat.1 acquired complete ownership of SBS Broadcasting Group, a multinational European media group based in Luxembourg. After this acquisition, ProSiebenSat.1 became Europe's second‐largest broadcaster, until Discovery Communications bought the Nordic portion of SBS in 2012.
RELX Group (UK)
What was formerly known as Reed Elsevier is now known as RELX Group. The company describes itself as a “global provider of information and analytics for professional and business customers across industries.” RELX Group is best known for selling information, in both print and digital formats, and operates in four basic market segments: (1) scientific, technical, and medical; (2) risk and business analytics; (3) legal; and (4) exhibitions.27 The latter concerns special events, such as trade shows.
The company offers such materials as textbooks, journals, and databases for the business and professional community. One of its best known products is LexisNexis, a vast online database of major importance in such areas as news, law, legislation, and finance. Depending on which version of LexisNexis is accessed, the database contains such content as complete news stories from numerous sources around the globe, including both print, broadcast, and digital sources, detailed legislative reports, and even individual credit scores.
RELX Group also offers such additional databases as Scopus, described as the world's most extensive database of research abstracts and citations, and ScienceDirect, which is the world's largest database of primary research in science and medicine.
Reed International, a British publisher, merged in 1993 with Elsevier Scientific Publishers to form Reed Elsevier, based in London and Amsterdam. RELX Group, as the company is now known, publishes textbooks, journals, and other reference material within the medical and scientific fields. It is the largest such publisher in the world and has a strong presence online.
In recent years, RELX Group has come under fire for its rather expensive subscription fees, with entire editorial boards resigning and launching new competing publications. Another controversy arose over what was seen as a conflict of interest between publications on medical advancement and scientific enlightenment, on the one hand, and the company's investment in the arms trade, on the other. This resulted in the parent company selling its weapons division in 2008.
Despite the name change from Reed Elsevier to RELX Group, to some extent the older names Reed and Elsevier are retained. Reed handles the “exhibitions” (events) side of the company, for example, while the Elsevier name still appears in connection with such materials as medical journals.
Sky (UK)
What is now known as Sky UK was originally known as British Sky Broadcasting, Ltd., BSkyB, and Sky. The company became a major player in European media after its arrival in the 1980s. Sky was backed by Rupert Murdoch, the American media magnate who was born in Australia. Sky Television, as an encrypted (scrambled) pay TV service, experienced financial losses until the company merged in 1990 with rival pay service British Satellite Broadcasting. The new company was called British Sky Broadcasting, or BSkyB, and was commonly referred to as Sky.
By 1993, Sky began offering a fee‐based multichannel service. By 2010, Sky was reaching 10 million homes throughout Europe as a pay direct broadcast satellite (DBS) service. As a pay service via satellite, Sky had experienced some competition from DTT, a service which uses a special form of local transmitter tower to transmit multiple channels over the air on a “free‐to‐view” basis.
When the old Ondigital DTT service in the UK, later called ITV Digital, was replaced by a new service, Freeview, Sky became a joint stakeholder along with the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, and Arqiva. Subsequently, Freeview became the UK's most popular digital TV platform, taking that status away from Sky, which remains the UK's most popular pay service. Freeview is discussed in more detail in Chapter 8.
Currently, Sky is championing the growth of its pay streaming services, which are widely available in Europe, in addition to satellite options. In 2017, European competition regulators provided a go‐ahead for Rupert Murdoch's 21st Century Fox to take full control of Sky. Then in 2018, Comcast became the highest bidder, at nearly $39 billion, in a battle to own Sky, with Fox seen as likely to sell off its shares in Sky.
Spotify (Sweden)
Spotify is considered the largest global music‐streaming service using audio only, and is based in Stockholm, Sweden. Spotify also offers video streaming and podcast services. The company began in 2006, and Spotify's streaming platform began operations in 2008. The service is available in much of the world, including most of Europe and most of the Americas, parts of Asia, and in Australia and New Zealand. Spotify appeared in the United States in 2011.
Spotify has been increasing its involvement in China's most prominent online digital music service, Tencent Media Entertainment (TME). TME also operates China's most popular social platforms. In recent years, much competition has arisen from YouTube, which despite its video focus has emerged as the world's leading platform for streaming music.
Vivendi (France)
French‐based multinational media conglomerate Vivendi is headquartered in Paris. The company's beginnings can be traced to a water company formed in 1853. That company began to diversify, entering into such spheres as transportation and energy. In 1983, as Compagnie Générale des Eaux (CGE), the company established France's first pay‐TV channel, Canal+. Following this initial venture, CGE rapidly expanded into related telecommunications areas in the 1990s.
CGE changed its name in 1998 to Vivendi, and the company soon increased its holdings in other media companies. Vivendi and Universal Music Group acquired EMI Recorded Music in 2012. The following year, Vivendi purchased the 20% share of Canal + which had been held by Lagardère, another French‐based media corporation which was discussed in an earlier section.
Vivendi came to own Canal Plus Group, also known as Canal+, but parts were later sold to private investors. Vivendi had held a majority interest in game company Activision Blizzard, but sold more than 85% of its shares back to that company in 2013. Its remaining interests in Activision Blizzard, nearly 6%, were sold off in 2016.
In that same year, 2016, Vivendi launched a new service called Studio+, initially in Latin America. Studio + is described as the “first global premium short series offer for mobiles.”28 In other words, this is a SVOD service designed for mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets, and which focuses on short‐form video. Studio + follows a 10x10 programming model, in which each series consists of ten episodes, each only ten minutes long. The service is accessible in the US via mobile apps.
Vivendi bought an 80% share in Dailymotion, the web‐streaming TV channel/site, in 2015, and also increased shares of Telecom Italia and the French video game companies Gameloft and Ubisoft. They accomplished a hostile takeover of Gameloft in 2016.
Vivendi also has about a 29% investment in Mediaset, another major European media corporation which was discussed in an earlier section. In addition, Vivendi maintains holdings in Havas, another major global media corporation based in France. As of 2017, Vivendi owned a nearly 95% interest in Havas. In recent years, after some debt issues, Vivendi has been attempting to rebrand itself as primarily concerned with content. The company has described itself as having “international ambitions.”29
Significant Non‐European Stakeholders
European‐based media corporations are by no means the only non‐US stakeholders in the global communication industry (see Table 7.2). The following sections detail some additional noteworthy media stakeholders which are either non‐US‐based or whose focus extends outside of the US.
Table 7.2 Other noteworthy media stakeholders.
| APTN (Canada) |
| Baidu (China) |
| Cisneros (Venezuela) |
| Globo (Brazil) |
| NITV (Australia) |
| Samsung (South Korea) |
| Sony Corporation (Japan) |
| Telemundo (US) |
| Televisa (Mexico) |
| Tencent (China) |
| Univision (US) |
APTN (Canada)
Canada's Aboriginal People's Television Network (APTN) is headquartered in Winnipeg and calls itself the “world's first independent national Aboriginal broadcaster.”30 Like Australia's NITV, discussed in a subsequent section, APTN offers programming about, as well as produced by, indigenous peoples. That programming includes documentary and informational programming as well as news and entertainment from and about First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples in Canada.
The network began in 1999, and grew out of an Aboriginal network called Television Northern Canada (TVNC). APTN is accessible by broadcast, cable, and satellite. About half of its programming is unique to APTN.
More than 80% of its programming consists of what is termed for Canadian broadcast regulation purposes “Canadian content.” The rest of its programming includes indigenous programs from other parts of the world. About 56% of its programming is in English, 16% in French, and the rest in Aboriginal languages.
Indigenous peoples have often been portrayed in a derogatory way in mainstream media, while they have tended to be excluded as actors. The goal of the network is to present pro‐social and proactive messages pertaining to Aboriginal communities as an alternative to the traditional mainstream TV networks, which are staffed almost entirely by non‐Aboriginal personnel, while giving a voice to indigenous communities.
Baidu (China)
Baidu is a Chinese web services company, sometimes called “the Chinese Google,” based in Beijing. The company provides access to mp3 music and movies. A music service, Baidu Music, has 150 million users, but is not as big as Tencent Music, with over 600 million users.
Baidu also operates Baidu TV, which is an Internet advertising service. Baidu expects to derive half its income from outside China by 2020.31 Baidu is discussed to a greater extent in Chapter 14.
Cisneros (Venezuela/US)
Grupo Cisneros, or the Cisneros Group of Companies, was formed in 1929 in Venezuela by Diego Cisneros. The current CEO is Adriana Cisneros, who was educated in Massachusetts and New York. The company supplies TV programming for the Spanish‐speaking markets in Latin America and in the United States. Cisneros is now based in Coral Gables, Florida.
Cisneros maintains four divisions: (1) Cisneros Media; (2) Cisneros Interactive, which offers a digital ad network; (3) Cisneros Real Estate; and (4) Cisneros Social Leadership. Cisneros Media manages Venevision, a major TV network in Venezuela, along with various pay cable channels in Latin America and the Caribbean. In addition, the Cisneros Media Distribution subsidiary, which is based in Miami, is a primary supplier of Spanish‐language programming for Univision, discussed in a subsequent section, in the US. Cisneros Media productions are distributed in 12 languages and in more than 100 countries.
Cisneros Studios is termed the “largest independent producer of Spanish‐language programming in the United States.”32 The company also owns Mobius Lab Productions, a content generator platform which operates in conjunction with Getty Images in Los Angeles.
Globo (Brazil)
Grupo Globo, or the Globo Group, is Latin America's largest media group, as well as one of the world's most significant media corporations. Its Globo TV network is one of the largest TV networks in the world. Globo is diversified, with holdings in such areas as finance, real estate, and the food industry.
Globo TV programming is broadcast in almost all of Brazil through 5 networks, but Globo's output is also viewed in more than 100 countries through its Globo Internacional division. The Globo Group is also involved in other forms of the media, including film production as well as newspaper and book publishing.
Globo traces its origins back to the 1920s, when founder Irineu Marinho decided to add a morning newspaper, O Globo, after the success of his afternoon paper, A Noite. Globo's first expansion into broadcasting came in 1944, when it formed Radio Globo. Rede Globo, now the world's second‐largest commercial TV network, followed in 1965.
The company also offers subscription TV services, as well as an international TV channel which is available in various parts of the world. Globo Filmes co‐produces feature‐length theatrical movies for the Brazilian market. Recently Globo has entered into a joint venture with Vice Media to enter into broadcasting in Africa, Southeast Asia, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.
Internationally, Globo is known for its highly successful telenovelas, or soap operas, with titles which translate as, for example, Want Without Limits and Totally Diva. Globo telenovelas have been enormously successful in the world market, with exports to numerous countries including Israel, Russia, and the United States. Portuguese is the national language of Brazil, but much of Globo's output is produced in Spanish.
Telenovelas began to appear in Latin America in the 1950s, building on a much earlier vibrant tradition of radio soap operas called radionovelas. Radionovelas were sometimes acted out locally, on local radio stations, using scripts imported from perhaps Argentina or Cuba. Unlike American soap operas, which traditionally have been marketed to women in the afternoon hours, Latin American telenovelas have invaded prime time and attract audiences across age groups and genders.
Globo began producing telenovelas in the late 1960s. They quickly became huge hits, after Globo invested heavily in comparatively lavish production quality with frequent use of exotic and glamorous locations. This enabled Globo to achieve tremendous success in the export market, forcing other Latin American TV producers, in places like Mexico, Argentina, and Venezuela, to raise their production quality accordingly.
NITV (Australia)
National Indigenous Television, or NITV, is a government‐supported Australian TV channel which began in 2007. NITV focuses on the indigenous Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. The channel's mission is not only to make indigenous people a subject for Australian television, but to give them a voice as well.
Most NITV programming comes from indigenous producers. Some of that programming is simply acquired, while other programs are specifically commissioned by NITV. Much of NITV's programming comes from the Canadian Aboriginal network APTN. NITV is available in Australia by broadcast TV, satellite, and DTT.
Samsung (South Korea)
Samsung is a multinational conglomerate based in South Korea and heavily involved in electronics production. The corporation is one of the world's leading producers of cellphones, TVs, and screens for electronic devices. Samsung was founded by Lee Byung‐Chul in 1938 as a trading company which branched out into multiple areas before entering the electronics field in the late 1960s.
Samsung is the world's second‐largest information technology company, behind US‐based Apple. Samsung began producing the Galaxy smartphone, using the Google Android operating system, in 2010, and was the world's top TV producer from at least 2010 to 2015.
Sony Corporation (Japan)
What is now Sony Corporation of Japan grew out of an earlier company, Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo K.K. (Tokyo Communications Engineering Corporation), formed in 1946 by company founder Masaru Ibuka. During much of its early history, the company was known for electronic media products, many of which emphasized miniaturization and portability using the transistor, after its introduction in 1947 in the US.
The company was responsible for introducing the first popular video recording format for home use, the Betamax system, in 1975. Sony, in partnership with Netherlands‐based Philips, was responsible for development of the compact disc (CD) in 1982. In more recent years, Sony expanded into music publishing and motion pictures, through its subsidiaries Sony Pictures Entertainment, Sony Music Entertainment, and Sony/ATV Music Publishing.
Indications by the 2010s suggested that some aspects of Sony electronics were in decline. Much of this was because of increased competition in the game console area, as well as a fall in general terms from its former prominence as a corporation on the cutting edge of electronics product design. Cuts in Sony's workforce followed. On the other hand, other entertainment‐oriented divisions of Sony continue to prosper.
Telemundo (US)
NBC acquired Telemundo in 2002. The company produces and distributes Spanish‐language television programming, especially for the United States. Telemundo recently overtook major competitor Univision in the ratings and reaches 94% of US Hispanic viewers. Telemundo owns 17 TV stations in the US, as well as one in Puerto Rico. In addition to operating the Telemundo channel, the company also operates NBC Universo and its distribution arm, Telemundo Digital Media.
Telemundo, which is headquartered near Miami in Hialeah, Florida, is a division of NBCUniversal Hispanic Enterprises and Content. NBCUniversal is, in turn, owned by Comcast. Telemundo is termed the largest producer of Spanish‐language prime‐time TV content in the US and the second‐largest distributor of Spanish‐language programming in the world.33 Telemundo also became the first Spanish‐language TV network to achieve more than a million YouTube subscribers.
Televisa (Mexico)
Televisa has been one of the most prominent Mexican broadcasters for decades. Televisa has enjoyed status as the second‐largest media conglomerate in Latin America, next to Brazil‐based Globo, which was discussed in an earlier section.
Since its early days, Televisa has been owned by the Azcarraga family. The roots of the family empire date back to the radio era. Emilio Azcarraga Milmo began his media career during the 1940s at XEW‐AM in Mexico City, a station which his family later came to own. In 1972 the family formed the giant television network Televisa by combining two other television companies.
Emilio Azcarraga Milmo died in April 1998, leaving Televisa to his son, Emilio Azcarraga Jean. The son announced in 2017 that he would step down as CEO at the end of the year, even though he remains the company's largest shareholder. This was seen as coinciding with a steep ratings decline coupled with increasing fragmentation of the Mexican audience. Broadcast ratings fell by 30% in 2015 and 2016. Reinvention of Televisa was seen as mandatory.34
Under Emilio Azcarraga Jean's leadership, Televisa expanded into pay channels via cable and satellite, and could still grow through the company's recent moves into web streaming. Televisa programming can be accessed through web‐streaming channels and apps. In 2017, however, major web‐streaming device Roku was banned in Mexico due to piracy issues. This was after a lawsuit brought by Cablevisión, owned by Grupo Televisa, over concerns that pirates were using the device to allow unauthorized access to channels owned by Televisa.
In recent years, Televisa has entered into a symbiotic relationship with US‐based Univisión, which has been a major supplier of Spanish‐language programming in the United States. Much of Televisa's content is seen in the US on the Univisión network. A recent example of Univisión/Televisa collaboration is the series La Piloto, a crime drama aimed at younger audiences and with a continuing plot, similar in that sense to telenovelas. Although Brazilian content producer Globo remains the telenovela giant, Televisa is also well known for its telenovela fare.
Tencent (China)
Tencent, based in China, is one of the world's largest gaming companies. The company is involved in multiplayer online games and is also huge in social networking, messaging, and other Internet areas. As of 2015 Tencent was the second‐largest Internet company after Alibaba in terms of its market value. Tencent is discussed in greater detail in Chapter 14.
TRT (Turkey)
Turkish Radio and Television Corporation, or TRT, is Turkey's primary public broadcaster. In other words, it is the country's state‐supported radio and television organization. In recent years, TRT has enjoyed wide influence in other developing Islamic nations. Worldwide availability of TRT programming has been enhanced through its use of mobile apps and web‐streaming options, as well as through the introduction in 2017 of its international news service, TRT World.
The majority of TRT's funding, about 70%, comes from license fees, as with the UK's BBC, supplemented by taxes on electricity bills. TRT began in 1964, and was based on an earlier radio organization which, in 1950, was a founding member of the European Broadcasting Union. One quirk of geography which sets Turkey apart is that while most of its land mass is situated in Asia, part is in Europe, including most of its most populous city, Istanbul.
TRT operates various specialty channels, including TRT Haber (news), TRT Spor (sports), TRT Çocuk (children's programming), and TRT Müzik (music). TRT Türk is aimed at the Turkish diaspora and expatriates living outside of Turkey. The Turkic republics and the Turkish diaspora in the Balkans is the target audience of TRT Avaz. TRT also offers various radio services, some of them specialized in nature. TRT broadcasts not only in Turkish, but in Arabic, Azeri, and Kurdish as well.
TRT World is a 24‐hour English‐language TV news channel based in Istanbul. The channel can be accessed via apps, web‐streaming devices, and such options as YouTube and the channel's own website. TRT World has been characterized by some, however, as a propaganda arm of the Turkish government, following the amassing of political power by President Recep Erdogan after his successful quashing of a coup attempt against him.35 The Turkish government attempts to position TRT World as an expression of what it sees as a growing significance of Turkey as a world power.
Univision Communications (US)
Univisión is a US‐based Spanish‐language TV network which is dependent primarily on cable and satellite distribution. In recent years, Univisión and Televisa, the latter based in Mexico, have entered into close partnership arrangements with regard to TV content. Univisión had been a major Spanish‐language TV content provider in the United States, especially for cable, but then Telemundo, its primary competitor, overtook Univisión in terms of both ratings and ad revenue.
The relationship between Univisión and Televisa were expected to aid Univisión, but there have been other issues. As of 2017, some Univisión programming had dropped in the ratings, while the company was still struggling with debt. At the same time, Univisión's ad revenue was said in that same year to be “flagging.”36
The company grew out of beginnings in 1962, when Emilio Nicolas and Emilio Azcárraga Vidaurreta began a Spanish‐language TV station, KMEX, in Los Angeles. The company's expansion led to additional station holdings and the eventual formation of a cable network known as the Spanish International Network.
Involvement of the Azcárraga family associated with Mexico‐based Televisa elicited US government concerns about foreign ownership of US broadcast stations in violation of FCC rules. This led to sale of the Spanish International Network in 1987, with the new company to be known as Univisión Networks, and with Hallmark as the largest shareholder.
As a joint project, ABC News and Univisión formed a cable and satellite network called Fusion, which began operation in 2013. This service is in English, and is aimed at English‐speaking Hispanic and Latino audiences. Univisión also operates Galavisión, a pay cable and satellite TV network which provides movies as well as programming from other Spanish‐language networks, including Televisa.
Other Global Media Issues
A few of the major issues currently confronting global media are outlined in this section. One is the phenomenal growth in the Indian and Nigerian film markets. Another concerns developments pertaining to the connection between the media and sports, with the rise of eSports on a global scale. Finally, we will examine the continuing but evolving issue of American influence, in a general sense, on world media.
Bollywood, Tollywood, and Nollywood
There are three vibrant world film industries outside the core nations: first of all, Hindi‐language film in the semiperipheral nation of India, with production centered in Mumbai; second, the increasingly significant Telugu film industry, also based in India; and third, the burgeoning Nigerian film industry. The Mumbai‐based film industry has been dubbed “Bollywood” as a tongue‐in‐cheek label based on a combination of two terms: Hollywood, of course, and Bombay, the former name for Mumbai. As a carryover, the growing Telugu film industry of India is sometimes referred to as Tollywood, and the moniker Nollywood has been applied to Nigeria's film industry.
Contrary to a common misconception, the term Bollywood does not refer to all Indian film. Instead, the so‐called Bollywood industry only represents a portion of the entire film output of the nation of India. Bollywood output is in the Hindi language, in contrast to Telugu film, which uses the Telugu language. Telugu output is centered in two areas of India, one in Hyderabad and the other in Visakhapatnam.
A fact which often appears to astound Americans, who expect dominance of US films in the world market, is that India produces far more films in a year than does Hollywood. In terms of box‐office receipts in India, Bollywood takes the lead, followed by Telugu and Tamil cinema, both produced in India, then by other Indian regional film production.
Bollywood film has, in the new millennium, enjoyed something of an increase in world recognition and global exports. At the same time, budgets have increased dramatically in very recent years. Despite changes and updates in film content and themes, some traditional factors often persist. These factors seem to have generally hindered the attractiveness of Bollywood cinema in the eyes of American audiences.
Bollywood films are sometimes characterized by what is termed in India a “masala” approach, which refers to a mixture of genres and approaches. A single film might combine elements of drama, romance, perhaps a bit of comedy, and may even include music and dance segments. Also, Bollywood films are typically much longer than Hollywood films. All of this is tied to the traditional Indian practice in which theater‐going has been viewed as a family affair occupying much of an entire day.
This is changing to some extent, however. Formerly, Indian film operated under a strict censorship system, and violence and sexual content were absent. In more recent years, however, both have been creeping into Bollywood film. The 2013 blockbuster Chennai Express, for example, was replete with copious amounts of extreme violence.
Bollywood budgets are lower than those of Hollywood, and a few years ago could only be described in paltry terms. More recently, however, both Bollywood and Tollywood budgets have seen a dramatic increase. The budget for the 2015 Bollywood film Prem Ratan Dhan Payo, for example, was $33 million in US dollars, while that for the 2017 Tollywood fantasy epic Baahubali 2: The Conclusion was even higher, $39 million.
At the same time, however, the Indian film industry has been facing stiff competition from web‐streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime, and widespread piracy increases the financial gamble associated with big‐budget Indian film production. Bollywood cinema also increasingly faces competition from other film industries within India itself. The 2017 Telugu film already mentioned, Baahubali 2: The Conclusion, for example, was more successful in 2017 than any Bollywood film. Yet another factor mitigating against the success of Bollywood in India is a penchant in some parts of the country for films produced in regional dialects.
Plans are emerging for films and TV programs to be produced in India in collaboration with Netflix. In India, Netflix and Amazon Prime must compete with India‐based Hotstar. Hotstar is a streaming platform owned by STAR TV India, a media company owned by US‐based 21st Century Fox. STAR TV India is based in Mumbai.
The 2008 British drama Slumdog Millionaire did much to popularize the world of Bollywood to Western audiences, but Bollywood films themselves often do surprisingly well in the world market. The highest‐grossing Indian film so far is Dangal, a 2016 production which grossed over $330 million in US dollars.
Nollywood, the sobriquet for Nigeria's booming film industry, has seen phenomenal growth, although just what, exactly, constitutes Nigerian cinema is a matter of some debate. This is because Nigeria produces films in various languages, including English, and because some English‐language films are co‐produced by companies based in Ghana and Nigeria, with distribution generally by Nigerian companies.
In addition, sometimes the Nollywood nickname has been applied to films not actually produced in Nigeria, but in the Nigerian diaspora outside of Nigeria. Nigerian diasporic cinema is sometimes termed Nollywood USA, although such films might be produced in any country outside of Africa.
Despite the controversies over labeling, however, Nollywood is commonly termed the world's second‐largest film industry in terms of output, with about 1,500 films per year.37 Some of Nigeria's film output is readily accessible through Netflix. The Nigerian film industry is said to be not only large in terms of film output, but also in terms of global reach.38
The Sports Connection and the Growth of eSports
Since the early days of the media, the connection between sports and the media has been of vital importance. This partnering is particularly common in Europe, where many major broadcasting conglomerates also own, in part or in whole, major European soccer teams. US media firms also own several sports teams.
The connection between sports and the mass media has had a long and checkered career. During the 1950s and 1960s attempts to link the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the Summer and Winter Olympic Games with the world television audience were tenuous. It was not until the 1970s that the value of media rights for the Olympic Games escalated dramatically because of bidding wars between ABC, NBC, and CBS. In the 1990s the gray area between amateur and professional sports became even shadier when, for the first time, professional basketball and hockey players participated in the Olympic Games.
Today, the Olympics enjoy substantial revenue from a combination of media and marketing funds that were created as part of the selling package for host cities. Host cities incur enormous local expenses but recoup those expenses, plus revenue from tourism, thanks to the huge sums paid almost exclusively by US television networks. The sums paid by US firms for marketing rights supplement this revenue.
It should come as no surprise that sponsorship of the Olympics makes sense, and that this sports connection should work for corporations with regard to other sports events as well. Even now, the National Football League holds exhibition games in Europe and the National Hockey League holds exhibition games in Asia and Europe, as part of their attempts to go global. European football, known in the United States as soccer, has limited exposure in the United States except during the World Cup.
In the future, global sports leagues will emerge, and global broadcasting will parallel that movement. Current media outlets such as News Corporation, Disney, Time Warner, and others may aggressively purchase international sports teams in order to influence the allocation of, or to obtain, international sports broadcasting rights, primarily for teams that draw enormous global audiences that would be drawn to global products such as Coca‐Cola, American Express, McDonald's, Kodak, IBM, Google, and UPS.
In recent years, eSports, or electronic sports, has shown phenomenal growth on a global scale. This is a multifaceted movement, with much of its impetus focused in two directions: large‐scale gaming involving a number of participants scattered across a number of countries, and live viewing of video game competitions involving professional players.
Growth in popularity of the latter, in particular, has given rise to various online streaming platforms, perhaps most notably Twitch.tv. Twitch is now owned by Twitch Interactive, which in turn is owned by Amazon, which purchased the company in 2014 for $970 million. ESports are also accessed via YouTube. ESPN has also dabbled in eSports coverage, as has the BBC.
ESports competitions are surprisingly international, with the formation of some leagues based on certain regions of the world. The eSports industry is supported in South Korea by the government, with South Korean teams competing with teams in other parts of the world, such as Europe or North America. The eSports industry was expected to exceed $100 billion in revenues in 2017.39
US Influence on a Global Scale
As noted throughout this chapter, non‐US media stakeholders are continuing to play a substantial and ever‐increasing role in global communication. This chapter's descriptions of media conglomerates reflect the basic fact that the global media landscape is only partly American in shape, content, and ownership. Many powerful non‐US corporations are extremely active in the global media marketplace. Even though these non‐US firms may, at times, compete with Hollywood and New York, they do so while sharing the same commercial values.
The goal of non‐US media corporations which are engaged in multinational business is to maximize profits for owners and shareholders. Much like their US counterparts, they entered the global arena to increase market share. Most of these global communication stakeholders are based in core nations. Most rely heavily on foreign customers, whether they are in other core nations, or in semiperipheral or peripheral zones. Some, such as Samsung and Sony, need to have a significant presence in the US market to be profitable and to be considered major global players, while other major entities, such as Bollywood and Nigerian cinema, may be only minimally dependent on US sales.
In general, global media entities outside the US have taken advantage of the significant telecommunications infrastructural changes in the 1990s that encouraged privatization and deregulation. Back then, privatization resulted in commercialization, while such factors as satellite technology, cable systems, home video recordings, and the Internet were expanding rapidly. Since then, mobile and web‐based technologies have in large measure supplanted the media landscape of the 1990s, with such options playing an increasingly large role in corporate income. To a large extent, this is the case even in developing parts of the globe.
In Europe, government‐controlled and government‐owned media lost market share, and in some cases became phenomena of a previous era. There, aggressive corporations quickly sought to either extend their traditional interests in the mass media, beginning with print products, or to move into new areas and make strategic decisions to diversify previously non‐media corporations. The outcomes are similar.
All major global multimedia corporations are seeking to maximize profits in order to increase or improve the rate of return for their shareholders. They do this through a combination of expanding current markets and adding new market share through acquisitions or joint ventures.
Ultimately, they seek the expansion of electronic colonialism. Just as US global media firms seek foreign customers in Asia and Europe, so Asian and European firms are aggressively pursuing customers in North America. They do so by producing programs and other media products that will attract a substantial customer base along with healthy advertising revenues.
This often results in multinational joint ventures. An example is the 2016 film The Great Wall, for instance, which featured American star Matt Damon, but which was directed by noted Chinese director Zhang Yimou. Despite issues, content controversies, and a disappointing box office take, the film was a US/China co‐production.
The Great Wall was released in 2016 in China by China Film Group and in 2017 in the US by Universal. US‐based Legendary Entertainment spent around $115 million on worldwide promotion and advertising for the film, which entered worldwide markets including Australia, Korea, Russia, and the UK, in addition to China and the US.
Such joint ventures mean that where funding would otherwise be inadequate, films can be produced for the world market through the pooling of the resources of multiple countries. This boosts the number of films produced while providing the funding for films which would not be made otherwise.
International co‐production is at the heart of the European Commission's attempts at elevating the status of European film in the world market. International co‐production in film is handled by means of treaties. These treaties spell out the minimal percentage of investment another nation must bring to the table, as well as determining how much of the overall budget will be spent in each nation involved.
At the same time, film distribution by means of web‐streaming services can enhance international distribution. This is only true, however, to the extent that streaming services like Netflix or Amazon Prime find the right ratio of expenses, such as acquiring rights to a film, to expected profits. In the case of Nigerian film, as already noted, web streaming has served to widen the world market for Nollywood cinema.
Such ventures pose an obvious dilemma, however: At the same time that, for example, Netflix distribution of Nollywood film enhances the Nigerian film industry, it simultaneously serves to enhance the viability of Netflix, an American‐based company, in the world market. It remains to be seen to what extent and for how long US companies will continue to play such leading roles in all spheres of the media, while economies, technologies, communication infrastructures, and media options continue to improve and develop in other parts of the world, including semiperipheral nations.
In the meantime, clearly customers with disposable income are free to make choices among a plethora of books and magazines, movies and television options, music streaming services, social media sites, and other communication options around most of the globe. Most individuals are unaware of who owns the content, who controls the delivery system, or how important advertising is in terms of revenue for these global empires. Few people could identify or would care, which firm actually owns the product they are viewing, listening to, or reading.
Nearly one‐fifth of the 21st century has passed, but major media conglomerates still continue their inexorable path toward global expansion, a trend carried over from the previous century. Occasionally, those businesses will back away due to momentary financial reverses, but in an overall sense the trend toward a multinational presence for major media companies continues unabated.
The biggest global communication firms are conducting most of their business abroad, or are capturing more customers in foreign markets, and have less to do with the nation‐state in which their corporation was established. A global mindset or outlook, global advertising, and global strategic planning reflect the successful communication management of today, a stance largely aided by an increasing dependence on web‐based services and options.
Business without borders is the norm rather than the exception for global multimedia corporations. Like the web which so largely powers global media, global communication systems and products transcend national boundaries.
Notes
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- 3. See, for example, Juan E. Conradi, “Cultural Dependence and the Sociology of Knowledge: The Latin American Case," International Journal of Contemporary Sociology 8(1) (1971), 35–55; Kaarle Nordenstreng and Tapio Varis, Television Traffic: A One‐Way Street? Reports and Papers of Mass Communication No. 70, Paris: UNESCO, 1974; and Thomas Guback, The International Film Industry, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1969.
- 4. See, for example, Ben Bagdikian, The Media Monopoly, Boston: Beacon, 2000; Jeremy Tunstall, The Media Are American, New York: Columbia University Press, 1977; Thomas McPhail and Brenda McPhail, Communication: The Canadian Experience, Toronto: Copp Clark Pitman, 1990; and Anthony Smith, The Geopolitics of Information: How Western Culture Dominates the World, New York: Oxford University Press, 1980.
- 5. See, for example, Andrew A. Moemeka (ed.), Communicating for Development, Albany: State University of New York Press, 1994; Oliver Boyd‐Barnett, The International News Agencies, London: Constable, 1980; Tsan Kuo Chang, “All Countries Not Created Equal to Be News,” Communication Research 25(5) (October 1998), 528–563; Rob Kroes, “American Empire and Cultural Imperialism: A View from the Receiving End,” Diplomatic History 23 (1999), 463–478; and Thomas L. McPhail, Development Communication: Reframing the Role of the Media, UK: Wiley Blackwell, 2009.
- 6. Herbert I. Schiller, Communication and Cultural Domination, White Plains, NY: International Arts and Sciences Press, 1976; see also J. Tomlinson, Cultural Imperialism: A Critical Introduction, London: Pinter, 1991.
- 7. See, for example, http://www.americanforeignrelations.com/A‐D/Cultural‐Imperialism‐Critics‐of‐cultural‐imperialism‐theory.html;,https://upndowns.wordpress.com/2010/03/23/does‐the‐cultural‐imperialism‐thesis‐still‐have‐relevance‐today/;,https://dangngoctrinh.wordpress.com/2014/07/05/media‐imperialism‐revisited/; and http://www.jiyanwei.com/mediapedia/media‐and‐globalization/, accessed December 15, 2017.
- 8. See, for example, Chapter 4: “Homogenization,” in Terhi Rantanen, The Media and Globalization, London: Sage Publications (2005) 74–92.
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