Eight bidders have been shortlisted for the proposed independently-funded news consortia (IFNC) pilots, but five have been rejected…
The Department of Culture, Media & Sport has published its list of consortia that have been successful in getting through to the next round of assessment to get funding for IFNC pilots…
Wales
– Taliesin (ITN, Newsquest, Northcliffe Media, Tindle, Boomerang and ITV (LSE: ITV) Wales news staff)
– Tinopolis
– Wales Live (UTV and NWN Media)
Scotland
– Johnston Press, the Herald and Times Group, Tinopolis, and D C Thomson
– STV, ITN and Bauer Radio
Tyne Tees/Borders (the England pilot)
– ITN with Johnston Press, Newsquest, Metro Radio, University of Sunderland and ITV Tyne Tees and Borders news staff;
– Trinity Mirror (LSE: TNI), the Press Association and Ten Alps;
– UTV
The IFNCs are an idea from Lord Carter’s Digital Britain white paper (and now in Lord Mandelson’s Digital Economy Bill) to rescue nations-and-regions news provision, amid the likely relaxation of ITV’s regional news commitment and the continuing local newspaper malaise. “Multi-media” is the watchword, and is leading to some strange bedfellows. These eight will now be issued an “Invitation to Participate in Dialogue” ahead of a final decision in March.
Five more bids were submitted but rejected – of those, only a Scottish bid led by Trinity Mirror was known to the public. Despite publicly saying it would bid in Wales, Trinity Mirror confirmed to us last week: “We held talks with potential partners for the Welsh pilot – however those discussions did not progress to a bid. We remain extremely supportive of the Welsh IFNC pilot and will look at further opportunities to be involved should they arise.”
Robert adds: I’m hearing that bidders consider the process highly fluid – some names have been added to some consortia configurations even after bids were submitted to the DCMS.
At least one JV partner may yet switch to another bid. And there are still names not on this DCMS list that some bidders are talking about as potential new alliance members. In other words, plenty could yet change…
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