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The Walt Disney Company is putting down $650 million to acquire a 99-year lease on a large development site at 4 Hudson Square in lower Manhattan. According to Disney, the new location, which occupies a full city block, will be home to its New York operations, with offices and production spaces for WABC-TV, ABC News, “Live with Kelly and Ryan,” “The View” and Disney Streaming Services. “Good Morning America” would still be based in ABC’s Times Square studio. Disney is the parent company of ABC. The purchase comes as the company is finalizing the sale of ABC’s Upper West Side complex to Silverstein Properties for what The Real Deal reports are over $1 billion. ABC would continue to lease the Upper West Side property until work on its new facilities at Hudson Square is completed. Disney would also keep ownership of the Armory on 66th Street, where ESPN, also a part of the company, has offices.
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Condé Nast has launched a streaming TV channel for Wired, the publisher’s science and tech-focused magazine and website. The channel became available on Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV and Android TV July 1, and it is expected to debut on Roku this month. Programming on the Wired channel includes videos and shows from Wired.com and its YouTube channel, featuring shows such as “Autocomplete Interviews," "Almost Impossible" and "Technique Critique." Wired is expected to produce original programming for the streaming channel, and will also offer licensed movies and TV shows. Wired’s YouTube channel has 2.3 million subscribers, and Condé Nast sees the streaming channel as a way to reach even more people. “Our video business is one of the most important assets to our company’s future, recognized by our audiences and advertising partners alike,” Condé Nast CEO Bob Sauerberg wrote in a memo to staff. Channels for Bon Appetit and GQ are expected to debut next year.
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Oprah Winfrey, whose multi-year content agreement with Apple was announced on June 15, is investing in “health-driven restaurant” True Food Kitchen, according to a statement from the company. Winfrey has joined the True Food Kitchen board of directors and will take a role as a consultant for the company, which is majority-owned by New York-based Centerbridge Partners. Winfrey also has a $43 million investment in Weight Watchers. True Food Kitchen, which has around 3,000 employees, said it expected to double its store growth over the next three years.
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YouTube says that it plans to spend $25 million on news as part of the Google News Initiative’s pledge to invest $300 million in the industry. Google is the parent company of YouTube. YouTube’s investment is intended to help prevent more extremist and misleading information from spreading through the platform. The projects to be funded by the money include hiring more specialists to support publishers, helping publishers build video operations and creating a working group with news organizations to create new video product features and improve news on YouTube's platform. YouTube’s announcement comes as Facebook prepares to unveil the first programs to result from its partnership with news providers. Starting on Monday, July 16, shows from such sources as CNN, Fox News Channel, Univision and ABC News can be seen in a dedicated news section in Facebook Watch, the company’s new video platform for episodic programming.
Trump Media and Technology Group Corp. has replaced CEO and former California Congressman Devin Nunes with Kevin McGurn, a seasoned media sales executive.
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette is being bought by the Venetoulis Institute for Local Journalism, a nonprofit that is the parent organization of the Baltimore Banner... The British Broadcasting Corporation is axing approximately 2,000 jobs, about 10 percent of its work force... Snap, the company behind Snapchat, is also succumbing to layoff fever, announcing plans to lay off 16 percent of its employees, about 1,000 people.
CBS News Radio will go off the air on May 22, part of the axe-swinging managerial plan put into play by CBS editor-in-chief Bari Weiss... The Economist, which was first published in 1843, is changing hands. Canadian billionaire Stephen Smith has agreed to acquire a 26.9 percent stake in the publication from Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild, her family and family foundation... Nexstar Media Group says it has closed its acquisition of TEGNA, the broadcast, digital media and marketing services company that was formed in 2015, when the Gannett Company split into two publicly traded companies.
USA TODAY brings on Jamie Stockwell as VP of news, effective March 30. Stockwell was most recently deputy managing editor of news for the Washington Post... YouTube expands its likeness detection capabilities to a pilot group of government officials, journalists and political candidates... The AP Fund for Journalism adds 50 news organizations to its local news program, bringing the total number of participating newsrooms to 100. 
Versant Media Group, the NBCUniversal cable TV spin-off, today reported its first financial results as 2025 revenues dipped 5.3 percent to $6.7B and standalone EBITDA dropped 9.1 percent to $2.2B.
