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APN News & Media rebrands as HT&E

APN News & Media has officially rebranded, adopting the moniker HT&E – Here, There & Everywhere – in an effort to better reflect the company’s current portfolio of assets and position in market.

The rebrand was flagged in March in the company’s Annual Report with the company, which owns the likes of Australian Radio Network, Emotive, Adshel and Conversant Media wanting to find a new name to better reflect the “unique radio, outdoor and digital nature of the Group”.

It was revealed at today’s annual general meeting.

“Australian Provincial Newspapers (or APN) no longer represents our asset base and I believe that you will find the new name and brand to be a fresh and appropriate change,” said APN News & Media chairman Peter Cosgrove.

Of the company’s new name and proposition, CEO & managing director, Ciaran Davis, told Mumbrella: “The direction we are taking moving APN from being a holder of assets, to a media business, it was a good time to look at our name, change the direction that reflects who we are, what we’re doing and the sectors that we are in.

“When we saw Here There & Everywhere it encapsulated absolutely everything that we are because our content is consumed here there and everywhere. It’s more engaging content because with digital disruption obviously influencing peoples consumption of the media in the home, people are more engaged out of home, therefore we have more engaging content.

“More importantly from a shareholder perspective, where we believe it’s important is that a lot of investors look at APN and think its a publishing business, as of today we have zero exposure to publishing and we are not a publishing business anymore. It’s more a reflection of the company we are, its more a reflection of the history we have had and the shift we have made in strategic direction of media exchange,” he said.

The rebrand was done by Bohemia and Davis said the new brand “absolutely encompasses who we are because our content is here there and everywhere.”

“APN is going to move from a holder of media assets, which traditionally we were, to being a tier one media business focused on delivering great content for advertisers benefit.

“It is a reflection of our unique, out-of-home media assets in radio, outdoor and digital and our ability to better engage audiences to provide better relevance and engagement for advertisers. Ultimately our ambition is to make “Marketing in Motion” the most recognised way to build brands and audiences.

Davis said there were absolutely no dangers in moving away from the heritage APN News & Media branding.

“Our business is fundamentally different to what the APN business started as and has been for the last number of years, from an investor perspective there is only an upside to be had unfortunately about not being associated with tradition publishing because a lot of investors rightly or wrongly don’t want to go near it. But from our perspective it means we can move away institutionally and from an advertising perspective we can go to market with a much more integrated approach.”

There has often been confusion in market around the current name and branding due to APN Outdoor. While APN News & Media did own APN Outdoor, it sold 100% of its shares in 2013 however neither company rebranded. APN News & Media still has outdoor interests through Adshel, which it 100% acquired last year, and Hong Kong Outdoor.

Last year APN News & Media exited traditional publishing with the sale of its Australian Regional Media (ARM) division to News Corp and the demerger of NZME in New Zealand.

The company then acquired digital publisher Conversant Media which publishes the likes of The Roar and Techly for $11.6m plus earnouts.

The HT&E rebrand will roll out across the coming weeks.

At today’s AGM, the company posted a trading update, stating Group revenues “are in line with strong 2016 comparatives on a pro-forma basis”.

The company said the radio market remained soft in March and April and said ARN’s revenue year-to-date is behind expectation.

Revenue growth exceeds cost growth year to date, the company said.

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