Murdoch relaunches Down Under as News Corp Australia

The Australian arm of Rupert Murdoch's media empire, News Limited, will relaunch under the News Corp brand as part of a global revamp, its CEO said on Wednesday. Kim Williams said from July 1 the unit would be called News Corp. Australia, to coincide with "the launch of the new News Corp. globally". "Our new brand and logo have been designed to support a more coherent and logical identity across the globe," Williams said in an internal memo to Australian staff, seen by AFP. "We will work alongside our global News Corp. colleagues to combine our extraordinary assets in boldly creative new ways, creating compelling products." News Limited was the foundation of what is now a vast global media empire for Australian-born Murdoch, and the original firm from which News Corp. took its name. Shareholders this month gave the go-ahead to a plan to split News Corp. into two distinct firms in a bid to insulate its profitable entertainment assets from slumping newspaper revenues. One company will focus on news and publishing, retaining the News Corp. name, and the other will cover television and film, to be called 21st Century Fox. The "new" News Corp will include newspapers in Britain, Australia and the United States, including The Wall Street Journal and The Times of London. It will also administer digital real estate services, book publishing, digital education and sports programming and pay-TV distribution in Australia. News Limited is a dominant player in the Australian print media industry, owning 70 percent of the nation's newspapers as well as extensive online assets.