Gannett, Hearst, NYT, Trib Flex Their Quads, Form National Online Ad Sales Portal

Four of the biggest print and online publishers - Gannett Co., Hearst Corp., The New York Times Co., and Tribune Co. - this morning announced quadrantONE, a new joint venture to sell national online advertising inventory. The initial combined reach of the new network will be 50 million monthly unique visitors, and represents deep vertical coverage in 27 of the 30 markets dominated by the local news reporting of the powerful newspaper chains. The deal is the latest example of old line media companies banding together to aggregate and leverage their digital media capabilities (see Comcast story in today's edition).

"By aggregating the online audiences of quadrantONE's participating media companies, large national advertisers can immediately access tens of millions of unique visitors in the country's top markets," Dana Hayes, Interim CEO, quadrantONE, and senior vice president for sales of Tribune Interactive, said in the announcement. "Each participating company has agreed to dedicate advertising inventory to quadrantONE, so the network can offer customized online campaigns on a highly competitive basis. Imagine placing the same ad across hundreds of local Web sites on the same day with one buy-that's the power of this network."

The network will cover top markets such as New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Boston, Atlanta, Houston, Phoenix, Detroit, Dallas, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Cincinnati, Denver, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Orlando, San Antonio, Sarasota, Ft. Lauderdale, San Jose and Albany, N.Y. A full list of participating Web sites is available at www.quadrantONE.com.

Other affiliates have been invited to join.

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