Venerable media conglomerate E.W. Scripps said it has purchased Newsy for $35 million. Newsy is a video news start-up service known for hosting 3-minute news videos that users can stream.
Newsy, known for their comparative journalistic approach, can be a game changer for Scripps due to the site's large user base. In addition to this, Newsy is a multi-award winning site that has beaten the likes of CNN and Flipboard in the 2011 Appy Award's news category.
Scripps owns a large number of daily papers around the United States. Due to declining paper sales however, the company has been looking for ways to expand into other forms of journalism. Daily papers have been losing out to online news sites such as Huffington Post and Mashable and the Newsy purchase might be the perfect platform to revitalize Scripps.
After the completion of the purchase on Jan 1, 2014, Newsy will become a subsidiary company of Scripps. The $35 million deal can be considered an accomplishment for the video site Newsy since the company was started with less than $5 million in capitalization back in the year 2007. On the other hand, old-timer E.W. Scripps was founded over a hundred years ago in 1879 and currently boasts of revenues of over $1 billion.
The purchase will allow E.W. Scripps to gain access to a large online audience who prefer the content in video format. This includes people who often watch the news on their smartphones, tablets and laptops. According to Scripps Chairman, President and CEO Rick Boehne, "Newsy adds an important dimension to our video news strategy."
"It's a next-generation news network designed and built exclusively for digital audiences. Newsy's uncommon approach to curation and storytelling has helped it build a strong national brand, which fits well with both our current media assets and our ambitions to further develop digital media businesses," added Boehne.
Newsy founder and CEO Jim Spencer has also stated that he is proud of the deal. "Leveraging the power of Scripps and Newsy together means reaching more consumers with the quality journalism they expect on a larger variety of platforms," he said. "We are proud to be joining with Scripps, which shares our values of innovation and editorial integrity." Spencer and Newsy's 35 full-time employees will be joining their new parent company. However, Newsy will continue to operation at their offices in Columbia, MO even after the deal is completed.
