Digital Companies Prominent in Zenith’s Global Media Owners Ranking

LONDON: Alphabet (Google’s holding company) has increased its lead as the world’s largest media owner in the new ranking published by Zenith, with media revenues 166-percent above its nearest rival’s, Walt Disney.

Alphabet has steadily pulled away from Disney over the past few years—last year it was 136-percent larger than Disney, up 21 percent on the previous year.

The Top Thirty Global Media Owners report also counts four other digital giants: Facebook, Baidu, Yahoo and Microsoft—and all have risen up the ranking this year. Facebook has moved up from 10th place last year to 5th place this year; Baidu moved up from 14th to 9th; Yahoo from 18th to 15th; and Microsoft from 21st to 17th. Facebook is the fastest‐growing media owner in the top 30, with media revenues up 65 percent on last year. Baidu is second‐fastest (up by 52 percent) and Alphabet is third (up by 17 percent).

The Walt Disney Company ranks second this year, followed by Comcast (3rd) and 21st Century Fox (4th). Bertelsmann comes in at number 6, with Viacom and CBS Corporation at 7 and 8, respectively.

Also making the list are Discovery Communications (13th), Grupo Globo (14th), Time Warner (16th), CCTV (19th), Mediaset (23rd), ITV (24th), Fuji Media Holdings (25th) and ProSiebenSat.1 (28th).

“The big five digital media owners control most of the world’s internet advertising market, and its rapid growth is propelling them up the ranking of the biggest global media owners,” said Jonathan Barnard, Zenith’s head of forecasting. “The traditional media owners in our top 30 ranking have been scrambling to scale up their own digital businesses, to various degrees of success. As digital ad technology—such as programmatic buying—spreads to traditional media, it will further shake up the businesses of traditional media owners, but also provide them with new opportunities for growth.”