Bloomberg Media to roll out new products in October

Joe Pompeo of Capital New York writes about the changes being made at Bloomberg Media under new leader Justin Smith.

Pompeo writes, “Capital has learned that media group employees were informed last week that the first in a planned suite of ‘digital-led multi-platform brands,’ a politics site being developed by high-profile political journalists and ‘Game Change’ authors John Heilemann and Mark Halperin, both poached by Bloomberg in May with annual salaries reported to be north of $1 million, will debut on October 6—30 days before the 2014 Midterms—in tandem with a daily half-hour television show hosted by the duo that will air in Bloomberg TV’s 5 p.m. timeslot as well as streaming online.

“In a town hall meeting that lasted about two hours, Bloomberg Businessweek editor-in-chief Josh Tyrangiel, who’s been working closely with Smith on the media-group strategy, described the show as ‘much closer to ‘Pardon the Interruption’ on ESPN than ‘Meet the Press,” according to a partial transcript provided by a source. ‘One of our biggest advantages in politics is we are not ideological, we are not a sewer.’ (Presumably the show will share the name of the site: Bloomberg Politics.)

“The next launch in the sequence is expected to be Bloomberg Business, which will align with the content of Businessweek and businessweek.com. There had been talk of launching the business site ahead of Bloomberg Politics in September, but the internal target is now looking more like December, according to sources with knowledge of the roll-out.

“Other digital launches in the hopper include Bloomberg Markets, a financial title, and the luxury-oriented Bloomberg Pursuits, which is being overseen by Vanity Fair veteran Chris Rovzar; they will align with the respective print magazines of the same names. A tech site is also being discussed, sources said.”