The Schweizerische Depeschenagentur can be pleased about a returning customer: Ringier has concluded an agreement with SDA for the supply of all SDA services to all Ringier media. The publishing house had canceled its subscriptions to Blick and Sonntagsblick at the end of 2005 and only used SDA services for other media such as Schweizer Illustrierte and Cash. However, Blick and Sonntagsblick continued to use the sports service of the SDA subsidiary Sportinformation (Si). The contract that has now been signed has a term of five years and is based on a new pricing model, the Group flat-rate contract. As a result, Blick and Sonntagsblick can now also access SDA services again. Markus Rohr, member of the Blick editorial team, explains: "The regionalized Ringier media such as Heute, Radio Energy and Radio BE 1 are dependent on the regionalized services of SDA."

 
On November 26, McCann Erickson and Universal McCann brought English celebrity chef Jamie Oliver and his Flavor Shaker into Swiss living rooms for the first time. The kitchen appliance is being advertised in German-speaking Switzerland with an adapted 30-second and 10-second TV spot. Universal McCann places the commercial on high-reach channels in German-speaking Switzerland, with Diethelm Keller Brands responsible:
Laurent Voirol (Head of Communication), Shanna Gebbert (Marketing Assistant). Responsible at McCann Erickson:
Fabian Küchler (Text), Susanne Jungbluth (Group Account Director), Adrian Zuber (Account Executive). Responsible at Universal McCann:
Simon Mingozzi. Responsible at Ultra Images:
Conny Wolfenstädter.

 
On December 1, 2007, 41-year-old Thomas Hegglin will take over as Managing Director of the Dr. Peter P. Knobel agency. He replaces the 60-year-old founder of the agency, Peter P. Knobel, who will in future advise the agency's clients on change management, strategy development and crisis communication. Thomas Hegglin studied history and journalism at the University of Zurich, trained at the Swiss Public Relations Institute to become a federally certified PR consultant and completed a degree in corporate management at the Institute for Strategy and Corporate Economics at the University of Zurich. After completing his studies, he worked as a journalist for several years, most recently for the Aargauer Zeitung. Hegglin gained his first experience in corporate communications at ABB, and in 1999 he joined Nordostschweizerische Kraftwerke (NOK) as Head of Internal Communications. In 2001, he moved to Axpo in the Corporate Communications department.

 Ringier is selling the Romanian sports newspaper Prosport to Mediapro, the publishing division of the Romanian publishing company Publimedia, with effect from January 2008. The parties have agreed not to disclose the sale price. Mediapro is taking over the entire editorial team from Ringier as well as the staff employed for the special competitions organized by Prosport. The new owner guarantees that the working conditions will not be changed for at least six months, Ringier announced on Tuesday. Together with Prosport, Mediapro is also taking over all trademarks and domain names associated with the title. The magazine has a circulation of 76,446 copies on weekdays and 49,557 copies on Sundays according to the current certification.

 
After ARD and ZDF, this year's "Spritztour de France" was apparently also too much for the sponsor of the German cycling team, Deutsche Telekom: on Tuesday afternoon, it ended its sponsorship of the T-Mobile men's and women's teams with immediate effect. "We have decided to take this step," said Telekom board member Hamid Akhavan, "in order to distance ourselves and the T-Mobile brand from the latest doping findings in sport and especially in cycling. Given our long-standing support for professional cycling and the recent progress made by Bob Stapleton's management, this has not been easy for us." According to the company, however, it intends to continue its efforts in the anti-doping fight (Stapleton speaks, somewhat exaggeratedly, of the team's "leading role in the anti-doping fight"), which is a disaster for German cycling, but perhaps a sensible solution for Telekom. The unsportsmanlike behavior of several athletes in the German cycling team became a burden for the Telekom name, even more so after the public broadcasters ARD and ZDF, as moral authorities, stopped live coverage of the Tour de France after the Sinkewitz case. One is inclined to believe that Telekom's departure was inevitable. If you take the moralizing press as your guide, you are probably right. But if you look at surveys, things look a little different. According to a survey conducted by the consulting firm Sport+Markt
61 percent of those surveyed (out of a total of 1,000) said that their current financial backers would stick by the team even in times of crisis. Only one in five said they would not. And that was after the Spritztour de France. No sponsorship agreement mentions loyalty to the Nibelung, but after Telekom had benefited from the popularity of cycling for years, this departure leaves a somewhat stale aftertaste. In view of the above survey results, a further commitment by Telekom could have been worthwhile.

 The Blick Group is cutting a total of 9.8 jobs as part of a cost-cutting program. This affects 18 employees. The Sonntagsblick, where 3.6 jobs are being cut, is affected. At Blick, 2.4 jobs in the editorial department and 3.8 jobs in the back office will be cut. A "generous social plan" is in place, Ringier announced. If possible, those affected will be offered internal positions. The job cuts are part of a cost-cutting program, according to Ringier. Following the relaunch of Sonntagsblick and its magazine, everything at Blick is now also set to change: On March 5, 2008, the tabloid will be published with a new layout and new content. The scope will be expanded and early delivery in the conurbations will be examined.
As part of the relaunch, the cartoonist Nico also has to go, as reported by Persönlich.com. His style does not suit the new Blick, Blick editor-in-chief Bernhard Weissberg told Werbewoche. Nico, who used to draw for the Tages-Anzeiger, will remain with Blick until the end of February.

Roger Schawinski's new station Radio 1 is strengthening its editorial team with Tobias Schneider. In his last position, Schneider was a producer at Radio DRS 1 and DRS 1 Online. From 2000 to 2003, Tobias Schneider was responsible for the development of Tagesanzeiger.ch and Zueritipp.ch. From 1996 to 1998, he was editor at Radio 24. Roger Schawinski is delighted with this new addition: "Tobias Schneider was one of the best editors I have experienced in the entire history of Radio 24."

To mark the 175th anniversary of the University of Zurich, a special NZZ supplement will be published in 2008 in cooperation with the Institute of Journalism Studies. Together with the NZZ editorial team, seminar participants are working on the special supplement "175 Years of the University of Zurich", as detailed in a press release. It will be published in tabloid format on Monday, February 25, 2008, with the NZZ and distributed with an additional circulation of 50,000 copies. Following its successful launch at the end of September 2007, the NZZ Campus magazine will be published twice in 2008 as announced: The first issue will again be enclosed with the NZZ on March 11 and distributed to students with an additional circulation of 30,000 copies. The second issue is scheduled for September 22, 2008.

Massimiliano Pantieri has been the new Sales Director at Publigroupe subsidiary Intermag Basel since November 19, 2007. Pantieri studied economics and business management at the University of Fribourg. He is a proven expert in the fields of international marketing and communication and has excellent contacts in the Swiss watch and luxury sector, according to a press release. Intermag Basel is a sales unit of Publicitas International Switzerland, which markets international publishing houses in Switzerland. In addition to titles such as Spiegel, Manager Magazin and National Geographic, the portfolio also includes the lifestyle watch magazine Swiss Made Magazine, whose founder and publisher is Massimiliano Pantieri.

 Since Monday, an astonishing number of Swiss people no longer have Sven Epiney or Beni Thurnher flickering in their living rooms. The reason: since the beginning of the week, domestic TV channels in German-speaking Switzerland can no longer be received with just a house or room aerial. However, as many have waited until the last moment to switch to digital television, they are now faced with long waiting times of between one and a half and two weeks for the satellite access cards required for satellite reception, confirmed Peter Kaufmann, responsible for DVB-T communication in German-speaking Switzerland at Schweizer Fernsehen, in an article in the NZZ am Sonntag on Monday.
However, this waiting time only applies to those customers who order the tickets in writing. Electronic orders via the Internet are processed within one to two days.
Demand for satellite television has risen sharply since the beginning of the year, Kaufmann continued: up to this point, around 3,000 households per month had switched to the technology. In the summer, the number had risen to 6,000 to 8,000 households per month, and in October to around 11,000. For November, Kaufmann expects 15,000 to 20,000 customers.
However, switching to satellite is not the only way for existing antenna users to continue watching television in the future. With a connection device between the antenna and the television, a so-called set-top box, the four national channels can continue to be received.

 Both Swiss television and the Zurich regional broadcaster TeleZüri enjoyed a golden Sunday last weekend. With a market share of 45.6 percent or an average of 1,028,000 viewers, the SF program "Die grössten Schweizer Hits" was again very popular in its fifth edition. The Zurich regional broadcaster TeleZüri also achieved a high viewer rating on the same day, albeit with a different program content. The election and voting coverage on Sunday was watched by a total of 603,200 viewers. The highest market share was 20.3 percent shortly after 2 pm.
The SonnTalk program, which was broadcast live from the Walcheturm, also attracted a very high level of attention. It was watched by 173,000 people.

The new Radio 1 station's morning show is to be presented by a team of two presenters, one woman and one man. Irina Hollander is already on board. The 41-year-old was a presenter at DRS 3 for six years and was involved in various programs there, as Radio 1 announced on Monday. In recent years, Irina Hollander has mainly worked as a speaker and crisis coach and was a singer in various music projects. Roger Schawinski says of this new addition: "For me, Irina has one of the most exciting female voices. She is also incredibly talented, has a great sense of humor and is a wonderful fit for our team." Irina Hollander says: "I can hardly wait until we go on air. And I can't wait to meet my future husband."