Immediate Media

Immediate Media Company Limited (styled as Immediate Media Co) is a combined publishing house containing the former assets of Origin Publishing, Magicalia and BBC Magazines. It was formed on 1 November 2011 and is owned by Exponent Private Equity. Immediate Media Co. publishes over 70 interest-based, multi-platform brands, maintains over 50 websites, and employs over 1100 staff in its offices in Hammersmith, London, Bristol, Redditch, Camberley and Manchester. Immediate is the current publisher of a diverse range of publications, including the Radio Times, Gardens Illustrated and BBC Top Gear Magazine. Tom Bureau - who has a background in digital media as well as traditional publishing - is Immediate's CEO. 60% of Immediate's profit is generated by the Radio Times, which is now spearheading the company's moves into online retailing. In 2017, Immediate Media Company was bought by Hubert Burda Media

One of the components that formed Immediate was BBC Magazines, the magazine publishing division of BBC Worldwide, the commercial subsidiary of the BBC. The corporation had a long history of publishing magazines including the Radio Times which dates back to 1923. In 2007 BBC Magazines dropped plans to launch an international news-based magazine with the working title Newsbrief tied closely with the BBC's flagship current affairs programme, Newsnight. In late 2011 the BBC's magazine-publishing business was sold to Exponent Private Equity following the clearance by the Office of Fair Trading of the purchase. It is now part of the Immediate Media Company and BBC Magazines titles are published by Immediate under licence from BBC Worldwide.

Another component that made up Immediate was Magicalia Limited, a digital cross-media publisher and platform provider, based in London, England. In late 2011 the assets of Magicalia were combined with those of Origin Publishing and BBC Magazines to form Immediate. Tom Bureau, CEO of Magicalia, became the Chief Executive of the new company. Magicalia was founded in 1999 as a digital-only publisher by entrepreneurs by Adam Laird and Jeremy Tapp with its inaugural website, bikemagic.com. In 2000, Magicalia started to help publishers create and publish their own websites, with clients such as Runner's World (Rodale). The following year, Magicalia started building ecommerce platforms for retailers who wanted to create an online presence. In 2006 Magicalia was acquired by Exponent Private Equity for £13m, which was closely followed by the acquisition of Encanta Media. Encanta published 9 special-interest magazines, and Magicalia wanted to create a cross-media strategy incorporating both print titles and online sites. Former CNET Networks UK MD Tom Bureau joined as CEO and Duncan Tickell as MD Publishing from Incisive Media.