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Sydney, Sept 14: Rupert Murdoch's News Corp Ltd said on Monday that it was close to reaching 75 per cent of the world's population following the recent launch of new satellite platforms.
In its annual report, the multimedia giant also said it was determined to become a fully global company, establishing itself outside the English-speaking world.
"We have an advantage in this," chief executive Rupert Murdoch wrote in his review of operations, noting that competitors were dominated by a single national perspective.
"We have international origins. Our senior management is multinational and becoming more so every day," he said.
"With our launch of satellite platforms in Latin America and Japan, we are close to attaining global reach approaching 75 per cent of the world's population," he added.
News Corp, which generated 35 per cent of its $12.8billion revenues in 1997/98 from television, has the Fox television network and a range of satellite and cable operations in the United States, Britain, Asia,Australia and Latin America.
In the coming year, the group would greatly expand its just launched direct-to-home television service with its partners in Japan and, it hoped, India, Murdoch said.
He said the group's 21 per cent rise in operating profit before extraordinary items to $1.22 billion in 1997-98 ended June 30 was achieved in spite of a slight decline in earnings from its newspaper division.
"We expect real but moderate gains next year, inhibited partly by the difficult climate in Asia," he said, without being more specific on prospective 1998-99 earnings.
Asia had also affected the 50 per cent-owned Ansett Airlines in Australia, which made a pre-tax trading profit of A$28 million - a trading profit margin of just 0.8 per cent.
Murdoch said results from TV Guide were also disappointing, but this was expected to improve following the cash and stock deal with Prevue Channel, announced in June.
The planned partial float of the Fox Entertainment Group would unlock the value of News'sholdings, he said.
Murdoch also pointed to the importance of big events, such as the Super Bowl and the Titantic movie phenomenon, and the move to audience fragmentation due to new choices available to viewers.
The company was following fragmentation down with ever more channels, 25 in Britain and 40 in the United States, he said.
At the same time it was interested in televising major events, and was aware of the importance of branding as consumers looked for familiar brands to guide them.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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This story was printed from Net Express located at http://www.expressindia.com. Net Express provides a portal to India, with news from The Indian Express and The Financial Express along with sites on travel and tourism, the entertainment industry, the power sector, the environment and much more.
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