News Corporation

The original News Corporation or News Corp. was an American multinational mass media corporation headquartered in New York City. It was the world's fourth-largest media group in 2014 in terms of revenue. Board members include prominent former Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar.

News Corporation was a publicly traded company listed on the NASDAQ. Formerly incorporated in Adelaide, South Australia, the company was re-incorporated under Delaware General Corporation Law after a majority of shareholders approved the move on 12 November 2004. News Corporation was headquartered at 1211 Avenue of the Americas, New York, in the newer 1960s–1970s corridor of the Rockefeller Center complex.

On 28 June 2012, Rupert Murdoch announced that, after concerns from shareholders in response to its recent scandals and to "unlock even greater long-term shareholder value", News Corporation's assets would be split into two publicly traded companies, one oriented towards media, and the other towards publishing. The split formally took place on 28 June 2013; where the present News Corp. was renamed 21st Century Fox and consists primarily of media outlets, while a new News Corp was formed to take on the publishing and Australian broadcasting assets .

News Corp

News Corporation (officially referred to as New News Corp; trading as News Corp) is an American multinational mass media company, formed as a spin-off of the former News Corporation (as founded by Rupert Murdoch in 1979) focusing on newspapers and publishing. It is one of two companies which succeeded the former News Corporation, alongside 21st Century Fox—which consists of the old News Corporation's broadcasting and media properties, such as Fox Entertainment Group. The spin out was structured so that 21st Century Fox would be the legal successor and continuation of the old News Corporation, with the new News Corp being an entirely new company formed by a stock split.

History

Formation

On June 28, 2012, Rupert Murdoch announced that News Corporation's publishing operations would be spun off to form a new, publicly traded company. Murdoch stated that performing this split would "unlock the true value of both companies and their distinct assets, enabling investors to benefit from the separate strategic opportunities resulting from more focused management of each division." The move also came in the wake of a series of scandals that had damaged the reputation of multiple News Corporation-owned properties.Robert James Thomson, editor of The Wall Street Journal, was announced as the initial chief operating officer for the company; while Murdoch would not serve as CEO, he remained a chairman and a shareholder of the new News Corp. Thomson promised that the new company would "cultivate a start-up sensibility even though we already work for the world’s most established and prestigious diversified media and information services company", and would emphasize building new business models around its properties and content. The logo of the new News Corporation was unveiled at an investor presentation on May 28, 2013; the handwritten logo uses script based on Murdoch's own handwriting.

Rupert Murdoch

Keith Rupert Murdoch /ˈmɜːrdɒk/,AC, KCSG (born 11 March 1931) is an Australian-born American media proprietor. Murdoch became managing director of Australia's News Limited, inherited from his father Sir Keith Arthur Murdoch in 1952. He is the founder, chairman and CEO of global media holding company News Corporation, the world's second-largest media conglomerate, and its successors News Corp and 21st Century Fox after the conglomerate split on 28 June 2013.

In the 1950s and '60s, he acquired a number of newspapers in Australia and New Zealand, before expanding into the United Kingdom in 1969, taking over the News of the World followed closely by The Sun. He moved to New York City in 1974 to expand into the U.S. market, but retained interests in Australia and Britain. In 1981, he bought The Times, his first British broadsheet, and became a naturalised U.S. citizen in 1985 to satisfy the legal requirement for U.S. television ownership.

In 1986, keen to adopt newer electronic publishing technologies, he consolidated his UK printing operations in Wapping, causing bitter industrial disputes. His News Corporation acquired Twentieth Century Fox (1985), HarperCollins (1989) and The Wall Street Journal (2007). He formed the British broadcaster BSkyB in 1990, and during the 1990s expanded into Asian networks and South American television. By 2000, Murdoch's News Corporation owned over 800 companies in more than 50 countries with a net worth of over $5 billion.