Seven West Media will continue its joint venture agreement with Yahoo7 in the wake of the completion of Verizon’s acquisition of the embattled online player.
The $US4.5 billion deal was tipped to end the joint venture with Seven, but Seven has said it will “continue to invest in the market-leading Yahoo7 joint venture in Australia”.
“Both Seven West Media and AOL/Verizon will also explore broader opportunities that build on Oath’s consumer brands, original content, ad tech, proprietary data and potential acquisitions to further scale Yahoo7 in the region,” Seven said in a statement.
Under the new agreement, Seven will now launch and market its own long form catch-up TV service with TV content currently on PLUS7 and offer that through a new and fully owned Seven platform within six months.
The Yahoo7 JV will be tasked with exploring new opportunities with a broader content set including content from AOL/Verizon.
“Our JV partners own and operate one of the world’s largest digital advertising businesses and we look forward to driving home this leadership in local and global best content, technology and innovation," Seven West Media chief revenue officer Kurt Burnette says.
“Australia’s number one television network will now be even more seamlessly connected and sold with the number one commercial catch up TV service delivering the most effective ‘total video’ results for advertisers. The Seven team will continue its selling across all screens as has been the case for sport, sponsorship and integration and that will now extend and apply to all long form Seven content online.”
The completion of the deal ends the nearly five-year reign of Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, who isn't joining Verizon.
Yahoo will join AOL in a new Verizon business division Oath led by former AOL CEO Tim Armstrong. Oath's more than 50 brands include HuffPost, TechCrunch and Tumblr.
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