News Broadcasting
China Mobile, News Corp & Star in partnership to explore wireless space
MUMBAI: China Mobile Limited, News Corporation and Star Group Limited have announced a broad strategic partnership to explore wireless media business opportunities.
By leveraging the content assets and interactive services of News Corporation and Star, the partners will combine their strengths to develop wireless media services based on China Mobile’s mobile platform, through which China Mobile serves over 260 million subscribers. The cooperation will explore wireless media business opportunities on a global basis, states an official release.
Key areas of the cooperation will include development, production, aggregation and distribution of a wide array of wireless services ranging from music, broadband interactivity, and social networking to multimedia value-added products, informs an official release.
China Mobile chairman and CEO Wang Jianzhou said, “The partnership with News Corporation and Star will lay a solid foundation for providing wireless multimedia services. This is a very important step for us in view of the global convergence of telecommunication, media and Internet. With News Corporation and Star’s popular and quality media content assets, we will be able to offer more exciting services to our customers.”
News Corporation chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch says, “Partnering with China Mobile gives us immediate access to a vast consumer base throughout China. News Corp. has been a world leader in wireless content while our services such as MySpace dominate the online social networking craze. It is my hope that this partnership will unleash the creative and technical abilities of the talented employees of News Corp. and China Mobile to bring new offerings to consumers across mainland China and Hong Kong.”
Star Group CEO Michelle Guthrie adds,” Today’s partnership represents an important new media growth opportunity for Star. China Mobile’s world-leading expertise, customer base and exciting growth initiatives will allow us to expand the Star brands and services in the largest wireless market in the world. We look forward to working closely with them to bring a new level of wireless entertainment to the consumer.”
News Broadcasting
Senior media executive Madhu Soman exits Zee Media
Former Reuters and Bloomberg leader says he leaves with “no regrets” after brief stint at WION and Zee Business
NOIDA: Madhu Soman, a veteran of global newsrooms and media sales floors, has stepped away from Zee Media Corporation after a short stint steering business strategy for WION and Zee Business.
In a reflective LinkedIn note marking his departure, Soman said his time within the network’s corridors was always likely to be brief. “Some chapters close faster than expected,” he wrote, signalling the end of a nearly two-year spell in which he oversaw both editorial partnerships and commercial strategy.
Soman joined Zee Media in 2022 after more than a decade abroad with Reuters and Bloomberg, returning to India to take on the role of chief business officer for WION and Zee Business. His mandate was ambitious: bridge the newsroom and the revenue desk while expanding digital and broadcast reach.
During the stint, Zee Business reached break-even for the first time since its launch in 2005, while WION refreshed programming and strengthened its digital footprint across platforms such as YouTube and Facebook.
But Soman suggested the cultural fit proved uneasy. Describing himself as a “cultural misfit”, he hinted at deeper tensions between editorial instincts shaped in global newsrooms and the realities of India’s television news ecosystem.
Before joining Zee, Soman spent more than seven years at Bloomberg in Hong Kong as head of broadcast sales for Asia-Pacific, expanding the company’s news syndication business across several markets. Earlier, he held senior editorial roles at Reuters, overseeing online strategy in India and managing Reuters Video Services from London.
His career began in television and wire reporting, including a stint with ANI during the 1999 Kargil conflict, before moving into digital publishing as India’s internet media landscape took shape.
Now, after nearly three decades in broadcast and digital media, Soman is leaving Delhi NCR and returning to his hometown, Trivandrum.
Exhausted, he admits. But unbowed. And with one quiet line that sums up the journey: he didn’t sell his soul — because some things, after all, are not for sale.
