Seven West Media's James Warburton, appointed CEO in August last year, still has acquisitions at the top of his mind.
His moves so far -- including his tilt at regional broadcaster Prime Media -- have been frustrated by regulators.
And he is waiting for a final decision from consumer watchdog the ACCC on the sale of Pacific magazines to Bauer.
Today he announced a half year statutory loss of $66.35 million in an ongoing "challenging" advertising market.
However, he is focused on his content strategy and looking for opportunity from mergers and acqusitiions.
“We will continue to be creative and apply entrepreneurial thinking," he says.
"My mandate is to dramatically change the business which means transformative M&A opportunities are very much on the agenda.
"I believe we have the team, the platform and the strategy to transform and grow this business to increase shareholder value.”
Warburton is also looking to cut another $20 million in costs in the second half.
At today's half year results announcement: " Softer than expected market conditions in 2019 and into January 2020 have resulted in such projections for the remainder of FY20 being revised downwards. In response to these softer market conditions and to fund the new content strategy, thegroup implemented a $45 million cost out program, most of which will be realised during the second half of FY20 and into FY21."
A part of that has been to reduced reporting divisions to eight from 17.
The revised content strategy, outlined at the 2019 AGM as "simplifying" the organisation to be a content led company, is being implemented.
But this will "take some time" for the impact of the new strategy to flow through to earnings and cash flow.
"At the heart of our strategy for growth is a focus on creating and securing the best local and global content, and capitalising on our position as Australia’s largest producer of premium video content," says Warburton.
Strategic priorities:
- Focusing on content led growth by revitalising entertainment programming, driving greater ratings and revenue share performance
- Growing digital streaming and video on demand revenue
- Continuing to grow Seven Studios’ earnings by capitalising on the growing demand for quality content
- Redefining our working practices to become more efficient and effective.
The strategy slide from the half year announcement:
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