ABP Group Sets The Ball Rolling On Fortune Magazine’s India Edition; To Hire 20-25 Staffers

image Nineteen months after it entered into an arrangement with Time Warner (NYSE: TWX) to launch an Indian edition of Fortune magazine, the Kolkata-based ABP Group has set the ball in motion for the launch of the fortnightly business magazine, known for its annual ranking of the world’s 500 biggest corporations. According to a person familiar with the situation, the company was likely to launch the magazine in “a few months”. The company has started meeting potential editorial staffers with an intention to hire, the person said, adding that it will likely hire 20-25 reporting and editing employees. Two other people independently confirmed such meetings. All three sources spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The ABP Group, which publishes The Telegraph, Anandabazar Patrika and BusinessWorld, among others, said in October 2007 that it has reached an agreement with the Fortune|Money Group group of Time Inc. to publish the third country-specific edition of Fortune after China and Turkey. Group publication The Telegraph reported then that the magazine was likely to be launched in February 2008. The company hadn’t updated on the status of the project since then.

An ABP spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. Even though ABP has been tightlipped about the project, it is understood that Pavan Varshnei, president, English magazines, at ABP is overseeing the business side and D.N. Mukerjea is heading the editorial side of the project.

The 2009 KPMG-Ficci report on India’s media industry pegged the size of the country’s magazine publishing industry at Rs1,390 crore and said it would grow at a compounded annual growth rate of 8.1% to become a Rs2,060 crore business by 2013. The size of the print media business (newspapers plus magazines) in 2008 was pegged at Rs17,260 crore.

Fortune‘s global competitor Forbes entered into a licensing arrangement with Network18 Group in December 2007 and the magazine hit newsstands on 21 May. An international edition of Businessweek, the third big international business magazine, is marketed in India by the Outlook group. According to an industry source, while Businessweek earlier had plans to launch an India edition, those have been abandoned following difficulties in their US publishing operations.

Fortune will be the third major magazine to launch this year, after RPG Enterprises launched Open in April and TV18 introduced Forbes in May. And among global business news brands that are making a beeline for India, it will be counted, apart from Forbes, among The Wall Street Journal, which launched a facsimile edition in India last month, and Financial Times, which recently applied for permissions to launch a facsimile edition here, but is caught in a legal tussle with Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd over rights to its title.

Two key policy changes made by the government during the past eight months are helping fuel the slew of print launches. In January this year, the government said publishers of foreign newspapers could set up wholly owned subsidiaries in India to publish a facsimile edition here. In September last year, the government allowed publication of Indian editions of foreign magazines.

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