In Brazil, Roberto Civita Applauds New and Old Media, a Free Press and the Coming Tide of Investors [negritos meus]
Knowledge@Wharton: The print media, especially in the U.S., seems to be on the decline. More and more people are getting their information from the Internet. Some categories of advertising also, such as classified advertising, seem to be migrating to the Internet. Could you explain the situation with regard to Brazil? Do you find the same decline of print in Brazil? And what is happening with new media there?
Civita: First of all, broadcast television and radio in Brazil -- the so-called 'old media' -- are still booming. The press is not growing, but it is not declining. Now if you say print media, you have to be very careful. There are many types of print media. I would say roughly, for your audience, that the more segmented the media -- for instance, in our case, the more segmented the magazine, the more specialized it is, the more it does something very specific that only specialized magazines can do -- the less it has been affected up to now by the Internet.
The broad-spectrum media tends to be more affected than the more tightly focused. I'm talking, for example, about fashion magazines, car magazines, science magazines and travel magazines. These have not yet been affected at all. They are growing and prospering. The general print medium, for instance newspapers, will be hurt more in terms of their classified advertising than they have been in circulation. I would say that there is a long horizon left for print still. I wouldn't say that it is going to be a growth sector overall, for sure. But I would say that there are still opportunities for specific print media. And there is certainly going to be very profitable print media for many, many years.
I'm not talking about growth. There is an obsession in the U.S. with growth. [Everyone] is focused on growth. If you look at ROI, if you look at profitability and if you look at the relatively small demands for capital, print is a very exciting area. But if rapid growth is what you're looking for, I would say invest in other places.
