Nigeria’s growing market with its teeming young people, has earned the attention of international news media which want to reach out to as many people as possible in the world. One of these media is Bloomberg TV, which has decided to berth in the country with Bloomberg TV Africa.
With this development, Lagos joins London, San Francisco, New York and Hong Kong as broadcast centre for the media organisation.
Bloomberg, with over 15,000 employees in 192 locations around the world, which also includes 2,400 journalists in 146 news bureau across 72 countries, is known to deliver business and financial information, news and insight around the world.
Bloomberg TV Africa, according to the broadcast oufit, will serve as a hub for the African region. BusinessDay learnt that the TV station will work with Optimal Media Group (OMG) as its local partner.
OMG is known to be the pillar behind Nigerian Idol, X-Factor, Nigeria’s Got Talent, and other major football assets, and has free rights to air the English Premier League, FIFA World Cup and FIFA Confederations Cup. Rotimi Pedro is the Managing Director of OMG and the promoter for Bloomberg TV Africa.
The coming on of Bloomberg TV Africa will afford the development of local content in Nigeria and the continent at large.
“Over the years, Africa has been projected in the international media from the angle of reported speeches and conclusions about what obtains in Africa has often been hastily generalised. The table is about to turn, because more than ever before, Africans are beginning to tell their stories themselves and the international media is gradually having a better understanding of what obtains in Africa,” an industry watcher told BusinessDay.
It is also expected that Bloomberg will secure a deeper relationship with Africa, beyond what obtained before. In effect, diversifying into the African market will include better news dissemination, financial reporting, entrepreneurial feats, commercial investments and a proper way of projecting Africa in her true essence, and Nigeria has been chosen by Bloomberg TV as the hub.
Speaking with BusinessDay, the commercial director, Bloomberg LP, Lindsay Oliver, revealed that “We spent the last few years making Bloomberg TV more educative and entertaining.
We engage, entertain and educate our viewers, we go into economics, finance and all, irrespective of where you are all over the world, we reach you. We are reaching 310 million households worldwide but in 24 hours, there is only so much you can do.
We broadcast from London, San Francisco, New York and Hong Kong, but what we cannot do is to translate to other languages. We decided to partner with global expertise, with people who know the wants of people in their area or region.
KEMI AJUMOBI
