Washington Post’s New Venture

The Washington Post Company (WPO - Analyst Report), a diversified education and media company, has recently entered into a strategic partnership with Bloomberg, the leading financial data, news, and analytics provider. 

The partnership aims to launch a global news service, "The Washington Post News Service with Bloomberg News", that will provide selective news elements to newspapers, websites and other subscription based clients. The news service, which is scheduled to commence from Jan 1, 2010, will carry 120 stories daily along with photos, graphics and other news content. 

Washington Post and Bloomberg will also create a business news page for the Post’s website (washingtonpost.com), which will include content from the Post and from Bloomberg’s website. Further, Bloomberg will distribute Washington Post news through its Bloomberg Professional subscription service. 

The deal will give Washington Post a reach of about 300,000 new readers and provide Bloomberg with another opportunity to expand beyond its core business. In a separate development, Bloomberg appears to be the front runner to buy the BusinessWeek magazine from McGraw-Hill Companies (MHP - Analyst Report). The magazine has been bearing the brunt of the plunging advertising demand amid global recession. 

The announcement of the venture with Bloomberg follows the break-up news of the 47-year long partnership between Washington Post and Los Angeles Times. 

The newspaper industry has been reeling under the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. Publishing companies have been experiencing plunging advertising revenue. In order to survive, the companies resort to severe cost cuts by trimming headcounts, closing printing plants and so on, whereas others who could not withstand the headwinds went out of business. 

This has also been the story for Tribune Co., the owner of Los Angeles Times that has been operating under bankruptcy protection since December. On the contrary, Bloomberg has been resilient to the sudden economic downturn and proves to be a stable partner. 

The news service, "The Washington Post News Service with Bloomberg News" will compete with the McClatchy Co. (MNI - Snapshot Report) and the Tribune Co. owned news service, which will carry stories from Los Angeles Times.