TTA Holdings the distributor of the struggling TEAC brand that has been available in Australia for more than 36 years has reported a 46% decline in revenue and losses of over $5.6M during the last financial year.
David Richards
EXCLUSIVE:Chinese House Brand Supplier Put In Bid For Dick Smith
A new Chinese bidder has emerged for Dick Smith.
NRL & ARL Join Forces To Barrack For Telstra On The NBN
In a joint submission the ARL and the NRL have gone into bat for Telstra in a submission that claims that Telstra should be allowed to become a media Company operating on the new National Broadband Network.
The two codes said that the notion that online media rights content could be subjected to a new anti-siphoning list or some other regulatory instrument, without significant financial hardship for a national sporting organisation is simply delusional. The comments were made in a submission to the Federal Government investigating the impact of a new National Broadband Network.
The joint codes submission rejected the notion that one content service provider of our media rights is dominant over others, as the rights allocation is currently spread across a wide variety of mediums.
The submission claims that “Significantly the government’s discussion paper talks of the problems associated withTelstra becoming a media company but is silent on the growing reality that media companies are increasingly becoming on-line entities”.
Should a Telstra or any other on line provide be excluded from bidding for unique content while media companies entering this space remain able to through their existing arrangements, then competition will in fact be reduced in direct contrast to the Government’s stated goals. The codes submission claims.
The notion that online media rights content could be subjected to a new Anti-siphoning list or some other regulatory instrument, without significant financial hardship for a national sporting organisation is simply delusional. As the decentralisation of modern media continues to evolve, the proportion of rights funds gleamed from online rights will grow more rapidly than those of the more traditional media organisations.
These increasing funds are important to offset loses in traditional media funds while also increasing the reach, scale and scope of a national sport.
The Rugby League community would caution against any moves to increase the economic viability of the National Broadband Network over and above the wholesale network that would result from the rollout phase. The artificial inflation of the wholesale network to include premium content, for example: sports online media rights, which would need to be removed from a competitive market place would severely restrict the value that a national sporting organisation could realise and thus re-invest through its sport.
In the case of the NRL Telstra Premiership, Telstra’s online and mobile sports properties have strongly benefited consumers and fans. Thanks to Telstra, sports fans can access high quality and up-to-date footage and information when, where and how they want.
The emergence of online and mobile content offerings gives consumers greater choice and higher quality access to content. Restricting Telstra’s ability to acquire content will adversely impact Telstra’s ability to develop and offer world leading products. This in turn will adversely affect our fans and consumers.
What is at risk?
All funds received from the various media rights packages fund Rugby League from the top down. Rugby League needs to be able to sell its media rights with absolute certainty
in relation to the regulatory regime, across a wide range of platforms.
The revenue the ARL & NRL receive from the sale of online media rights benefits the development of Rugby League and the local communities in which it is played. Restricting, in any way, a potential buyer from acquiring online media content will obviously adversely affect revenues and the services offered to and by the Rugby League Community.
In 2008-2009 Rugby League will spend over $50 million on development activities across the breadth and depth of the Rugby League community, with total expenditure
exceeding $200 million.
The Rugby League community firmly believes that the current telecommunication regulations are sufficient to allow for the Government’s development of the National Broadband Network, without the need for further regulation.
Ultimately a sustainable NBN platform must be able to provide for a sustainable on-line economy for the production of the content that will decide its relevance to everyday Australians.
Fairfax Profits Tank 23%
Australian media group Fairfax Media Ltd has reported a first half loss of $365 million, a 23% decline on the same period last year.
The company has also wriiten down the value of publications like the Australian Financial Review, The Sydney Morning Herald and the Age as consumers desert the publications for niche websites and online news sources.
Chief Executive Officer Brian McCarthy,has said that advertising revenue from newspapers has declined significantly as both vendors and consumers move away from reading Fairfax media properties.
Fairfax has taken a $447.5 million loss on the value of its newspaper mastheads and licenses.
Sales at the publisher of the Sydney Morning Herald, the Australian Financial Review and Melbourne’s the Age newspaper rose 0.5 percent to A$1.44 billion with online growing by up to 12%.
Bloomberg reports “Cost containment and further cost-cutting initiatives will be key to the result,” Finola Burke and Belinda Tilbrook, analysts at Credit Suisse AG, wrote in a report dated Feb. 20. Sales “will come under pressure from a deteriorating advertising market,” they wrote.
Classified advertising is expected to remain weak for the rest of the fiscal year, Fairfax said today.
“We are focused on continuous operational improvement,” McCarthy said in the statement. “For now, we have battened down the hatches and we will ride this storm out.”
COMMENT:Sony Mobile A Serious Basket Case, As Consumers Shun Xperia Smartphone
One has to seriously question why Sony is still in the mobile phone market, they are under water and sinking fast according to the latest IDC Mobile Research.
Future Of Clive Peeters Decision Soon
EXCLUSIVE: Greg Smith the CEO of Victorian retailer Clive Peeters has said that he is close to a decision on the future of the business following an extensive review by KPMG. He admits that that he is talking to several interested parties with a view to getting either “an investment of capital” or an “additional shareholder”, failing this it will be “business as usual”.
Greg Smith the CEO of Victorian retailer Clive Peeters has said that he is close to a decision on the future of the business following an extensive review by KPMG. He admits that that he is talking to several interested parties with a view to getting either “an investment of capital” or an “additional shareholder”,.
“We are going to bring the issue to a conclusion soon, as there is too much uncertainty about the future of the business. We believe that it is in the best interests of everybody that that the review process which has been going on for 6 months has a finale. We are currently cutting capital expenditure and controlling inventory in an effort to preserve capital”.
When asked what will happen if no one makes a bid for the Company Smith said “This is a real possibility, it will be business as normal. I stress that we need to get this issue behind us. We have engineered the business to continue through the downturn and that is what we will do”.
Smith, who is also a major shareholder in the troubled group refused to speculate on which other retail groups, he was talking to however he categorically ruled out Woolworths as a potential investor or shareholder. However he did not rule out the Good Guys as a potential investor or even owner of the group.
Commenting on the recent Good Guys publicity in the Australian Financial Review he said “It was extremely unusual. While I have no knowledge of whether they are talking to Woolworths it does appear that something is happening as they are an extremely private Company”.
Smith said that during the past two weeks business had picked up but after this week’s Federal Budget he was not confident that “growth will be sustainable”.
He has also said that the Australian Federal Government may have to step in and support retailers and suppliers across the consumer electronics and appliance markets, if a potential cash-flow crisis emerges because trade insurance underwriters, such QBE, start cutting back on their exposure to the sector.
“In Australia QBE started cutting back last year and while there are no indication currently that there will be further cuts from QBE the issue could arise similar to what has happened in Europe where Governments have had to move in to support retailers. This could be an issue for the Federal Government going forward”.
Australian Business Told To Kill Off Adobe Flash Due To Security Risks
Adobe has been told to kill off Flash after it became a major security risk for networks.
Defunct Dick Smith, David Jones Deal Was ‘Lipstick On A Pig’
Several Hi Fi and AV suppliers have approached David Jones directly after Ferrier Hodgson announced that the deal that saw Dick Smith flogging CE products in the department store would end this week.
Free Condom Like Protection for Apple iPhone 4
Apple has finally come clean in admitting that their new iPhone 4 has major antenna problems and that they “screwed up” the design of the phone. Their answer is to offer consumers a free rubber cover to protect the phone
Creative Technology Struggling
The struggling Creative Technology group is back in decline after Microsoft denied that it was buying into the company. Facing a share decline this year of 50% and a massive downturn in profits the company is evaluating its future.
Microsoft will not buy into the struggling Creative Technology group according to a Microsoft spokesperson. Microsoft claims that will continue to work with Creative in developing new products as ‘we are the platform provider and Creative provides music devices,’ said Charlene Chian, the company’s public relations manager for Asia Pacific.
In early July, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates said at an industry briefing that the
That fuelled speculation that Microsoft would invest in Creative. And within days, Creative shares jumped by more than 20%. Some market watchers even predicted that the stock had ended its six-month slide.
Creative shares have fallen by about 49% since the start of the year and are trading at about 25 times their estimated 2005 earnings.
Many people say that Creative are not in a position to compete in the MP3 market and that all they are doing is dressing up old MP3 technology in an effort to take on the success of the iPod. Now with companies like Samsung and Toshiba tipping millions into MP3 marketing Creative are set to come under further pressure.
A Citgroup spokesperson said “Creative Technology is struggling and resellers are starting to turn to a new generation of MP3 players from a variety of other vendors. All that Creative has done this year is back peddling in an effort to compete on price. They don’t have deep pockets and investors are recognising this. The issue for them going forward is that the MP3 and Video Player battle is set to suck cash and this could impact on other parts of their business”.
NIck Angelluci Marketing Manager for Creative in