HT to launch pink paper by '07

HT Media Limited, India's second largest print media company, is planning to launch a pink paper in the next two years.

The pink paper, to launched nationally, may be launched either through a separate greenfield project or through joint venture and acquisitions route.

Benoy Roychowdhury, business head - media marketing, HT Media, told Business Standard that plans were on to launch the business paper in the next two years.

He, however, refused to divulge the investment figures and the name of the publication, which the company is eying to acquire. Presently, the company has two daily newspapers, Hindustan Times in English and Hindustan in Hindi.

The net paid sales of the two newspapers were approximately 2.17 million copies per day (Source: ABC certified figures for July-December 2004) with total readership of approximately 14.50 million readers per day (Source: NRS 2005).

When asked about the growing competition in the business news segment, Roychowdhury said, "We consider only Economic Times for competition, which is so far the largest circulated business daily."

"We are selectively considering entering into complementary newspaper business where we can leverage our brand," said Seema Chandra, vice president - finance, HT Media Limited.

The company during the year ending March 31, 2005 reported a total revenue of Rs 634.20 crore (Rs 6.34 billion) and a net profit of Rs 27.52 crore (Rs 275 million).

For the quarter ended June 30, 2005, the company had a total revenue of Rs 184.75 crore (Rs 1.85 billion) and net profit of Rs 9.8 crore (Rs 98 million).