Brazilian media conglomerate
Grupo Folha S.A. |
| Company type | Private |
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| Industry | Media conglomerate |
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| Founded | 1921 |
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| Headquarters | São Paulo, Brazil |
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Key people | Luís Frias (Chairman) |
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| Products | Newspaper, Publisher, Internet, Fintech |
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| Revenue |  US$ 3.0 Million (2021) |
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| US$ 500.0 Thousand (2021) |
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Number of employees | 7,000 |
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| Website | Grupo Folha |
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Grupo Folha is the second largest Brazilian media conglomerate, after Grupo Globo. It was founded by Octávio Frias (1912–2007) and led by his son Luiz Frias since 1992.[1]
The group publishes Folha de S.Paulo, the largest circulation paper in the country, which since 1986 keeps the leadership among quality general-interest newspapers in Brazil.[2] In the last decade, the group nearly tripled its revenue, getting to R$2.7 billion in 2010.[1] EBITDA reached R$600 million in 2011.[3]
Newspapers
In February 2012, Folha widened its lead among prestige newspapers in Brazil, with an average of 297.5 thousand monthly copies in circulation, 12% ahead of O Globo and 20.3% ahead of O Estado de S. Paulo, competitors in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo states. Besides Folha, the group publishes Agora São Paulo newspaper and has 50% shares at Valor Econômico, in partnership with Organizações Globo. Both are circulation leaders, respectively, in popular journalism and business journalism markets.
Internet and IT
Folha did the first real-time online newspaper in 1995, also a market leader among Brazilian news websites, with 232.8 million pageviews in March 2012. Amount of unique visitors was 19.2 million that month (audience measured by Omniture, which also provides metrics for Apple and CNN).
UOL, controlled by Grupo Folha, is the leading Brazilian company for Web content and services, with 27.8 million unique visitors and about 4.3 billion pageviews every month. Launched in April 1996, UOL offered both Web access and content in a single package, becoming the leading ISP in the country.[1] Later, it also specialized as an IT company, acting in ecommerce and epayments, gaming, dating websites, datacenters and IT solutions. In December 2010, UOL concluded the acquisition of Diveo Broadband Networks, becoming the third largest IT infrastructure services company in Latin America.
By the end of 2011, the group closed UOL's capital, buying back more than 17 million shares from minority shareholders and reaching more than 74% stock ownership; the group of shareholders led by businessman João Alves de Queiroz Filho, controller of the holding Hypermarcas, remained as a minority shareholder at UOL, with 25% of shares. Grupo Folha keeps the management.[1]
Printing, logistics, polling and books
Grupo Folha owns business units Transfolha (logistics) and Folhagráfica (printing). It also owns shares at Plural (printing) and SPDL (logistics).[1]
Plural, a 50-50 joint-venture with Quad/Graphics controlled by Grupo Folha, is the main graphic industry with offset printing presses in South America.[1] SPDL is a partnership between Folha (50%) and Estado (50%) groups, which distributes the newspapers by both companies.[1]
Grupo Folha also owns Datafolha, one of the leading polling institutes in Brazil; Publifolha press, which sold more than one million books in 2010; Três Estrelas imprint, released in 2012 to publish humanities books; and Folhapress newswire.
New platforms
The group's business strategy has increased the production and distribution of journalistic content designed to new technological formats, from tablets (like the iPad and Galaxy) to mobile phones, as well as in social media.[1]
In 2012, the paper began producing and broadcasting at São Paulo's TV Cultura the newscast TV Folha, aired every Sunday at 8PM. On its first show, on 11 March 2012, the show was seen in 60,000 homes in São Paulo metropolitan area, according to Ibope ratings.
