Bloomberg L.P. Fills Post, Suggesting Shift to News
Via NYT
Bloomberg L.P. Fills Post, Suggesting Shift to News
By TIM ARANGO
The news business may be in the doldrums, but the competition over business news could be heating up.
Bloomberg L.P., the financial data and news giant founded by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York, said Monday that it had hired Norman Pearlstine, the former top editor of Time Inc. and The Wall Street Journal, to the new position of chief content officer.
The move suggests that Bloomberg, whose fortunes have been buoyed by the selling of its hugely profitable data terminals to brokerage firms and investment banks, plans to expand the journalism side of its business.
Bloomberg’s sprawling operation, which includes 2,300 editorial employees, a television outfit and a radio station, has largely been used as a tool for the Bloomberg terminals. But the growth in terminal sales has slowed with the economy and as Wall Street suffers from the fallout of the mortgage crisis.
Adding Mr. Pearlstine to its masthead will polish Bloomberg News’ journalistic credentials at a time when the company is gearing up for new competition on almost all fronts. Last May, the Thomson Corporation bought Reuters for $17 billion to form the world’s largest financial data company. And last fall, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation completed its $5 billion takeover of Dow Jones & Company, owner of The Wall Street Journal, Barron’s and Dow Jones Newswires.
Also last fall, News Corporation introduced Fox Business News, a cable channel in direct competition with Bloomberg TV and CNBC, which is owned by NBC Universal.
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