Competition watchdog clears Bauer’s regional radio takeover
The competition watchdog today cleared Bauer Media’s acquisition of dozens of regional radio stations after the media giant agreed to match advertising terms.
Bauer last year snapped up almost 50 stations from Celador, Lincs FM, Wireless and UKRD. This included a 50 per cent stake in First Radio Sales Limited, which runs more than 100 independent local radio stations.
The move sparked an investigation by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), which warned the deal could leave stations with insufficient choice when trying to sell national advertising airtime.
However, the watchdog today approved the acquisition after Bauer agreed to maintain the terms for advertising representation to independent stations for 10 years.
“It’s really important that independent radio stations have good access to representation for national radio ad sales as it is an important source of income for those stations,” said Stuart McIntosh, CMA panel chair.
“Without the CMA’s remedy, it’s likely that these stations would have to pay over the odds for national advertising representation.”
The decision will come as a relief to Bauer, which will no longer be required to run its new subsidiaries as independent businesses.
The media group, which owns stations such as Absolute, Kiss and Magic, has been expanding its stable of regional stations as it looks to capitalise on a recent run of good form for radio listening.
Commercial radio stations now pull in 35.1m listeners each week, according to the latest industry figures. This is set to be boosted by the rise of smart speakers.
“This is great news for listeners and for commercial radio, and we are looking forward to welcoming Lincs FM, Celador Radio, UKRD and Wireless to Bauer,” said Dee Ford, group managing director of radio at Bauer.
“Audiences love and trust radio because of its compelling quality content and those stations joining Bauer will benefit from greater digital coverage and better access to national advertising.”
Main image credit: Bauer