Update: Debashis Basu says, in MoneyLife that the restructuring won't mend cracks in Network18's business model, saying that the "restructuring exercise of the group currently amounts to aimless shuffling of pieces on a chessboard." Earlier today: A capital restructuring approved yesterday by the board of the Network18 group will see a consolidation of ownership of its mature TV businesses under one entity, New TV18 (IBN18), and most of the other "emerging" businesses under Network18. Haresh Chawla, Group CEO of the Network18 group told MediaNama that the groups investments in the Internet business Web18 will also be merged with Network 18. Infomedia18's Local search, Yellow Pages & magazines, and TV18's venture capital investment vehicle Capital18 will also be de-merged to Network18. Restructuring The overall restructuring offers, in particular, a more holistic picture of how the entity's TV businesses are performing: the new TV18 (previously IBN18) owns CNBC-TV18, CNN-IBN, IBN7, CNBC-Awaaz and the group’s 50% stake in Colors, MTV, Nick, VH1 and IBN Lokmat; thus combining Business, General News and General Entertainment under one head. All future TV channel launches will be done by this entity. The changes in structure will be effective from April 1, 2010, which means that the broad level financials we get for Q1-11 will probably not be comparable with the previous years, though we hope results for Web19 will also be released. The restructuring entails the following broad steps: - TV18 will consolidate its TV businesses into IBN18 (New TV18) - Residual TV18 businesses (Web18, Newswire18, Forbes…
