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Cybermedia-Speciality Media

Printed From: The Equity Desk
Category: Investment Ideas - Creating winning portfolios!
Forum Name: Stock Synopsis
Forum Discription: A bried discussion of companies on very specific matters. Normally this is the prelude for further research as always members would be discussing quality companies with good management only
URL: http://www.theequitydesk.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=927
Printed Date: 21/Apr/2025 at 2:45pm


Topic: Cybermedia-Speciality Media
Posted By: jstk
Subject: Cybermedia-Speciality Media
Date Posted: 29/May/2007 at 2:27pm

Cybermedia ( India ) ltd ( http://www.cybermedia.co.in/ - www.cybermedia.co.in ) is a very interesting media company. They are South Asia’s first & largest Speciality media house with category leader products reaching out to 12 lakh readers & 7 lakh online community :

 

They have 12 publications in the infotech, biotech,consumer electronics & telecom area ( Dataquest, PC Quest , Bio Spectrum , Voice & data , Living Digital etc ) and a  end to end media value chain including the internet ( http://www.ciol.com - www.ciol.com ) and  Media services including market  research ( IDC India ), job board ( http://www.Cybermediadice.com - www.Cybermediadice.com ), content outsourcing, multimedia

 

 9-month financials for period ended Dec 06:

 Sales are up by 26% to Rs.74 cr,

EBIDTA up 22% to Rs.11.8 cr

 NP up 20% to Rs.5.8 cr.

 

Equity : Rs.10 cr

Current market price: Rs.113

M/cap : Rs.113 crores

 

Some of the businesses like job board & content services are in an investment phase & currently witnessing negative margins.

 

To enable greater focus on individual segments, the company announced a new organizational structure with 3 Business groups, headed by respective heads:

1)      Print Publishing ( all the 7 publications )

2)      Online properties, job portal & Life sciences

3)      Media services group ( includes IDC India which is the IT & telecom research business & aslo the content BPO )

 

Pradeep Gupta & Shyam Malhotra ( both IIT /IIM ) are key drivers alongwith respective business heads- Prasanto Kumar Roy , Hoshie Ghaswalla, & E Abraham Mathew all of who have been with the company for nearly 15-20 years.

 

With most new businesses expected to gain traction and ad revenues ( print & online )growing strongly, I believe that Cybermedia  offers tremendous potential and promise.

 
Would be great if some of the IT -related TED'ies could give their take on info / knowledge about the company.
thks, jayendra

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If you buy for a non-value reason, you will end up selling for a non-value reason.


Replies:
Posted By: sajanvm
Date Posted: 29/May/2007 at 5:19pm
Dear jayendra
 
I think Cybermedia could be v interesting if we do a sum of parts valuation for its businesses.  Some of these are JVs , so we need to understand how much cybermedia owns.
 
I am personally bullish on print media (speciality magazines) and own Infomedia . Cybermedia has a good niche and magazines like Dataquest have been around for donkeys years.
 
At 1 time sales, it looks cheap on the surface.
 
Rgds
Sajan


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Sajan

Posted By: omshivaya
Date Posted: 29/May/2007 at 8:15pm
Jayendra, I dont have an idea on this one. My apologies.

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The most important quality for an investor is temperament,not intellect.A temperament that neither derives great pleasure from being with the crowd nor against it

Posted By: deveshkayal
Date Posted: 29/May/2007 at 10:35am
The negative is that their magazines are read only by computer professionals.

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"You don't need to be a rocket scientist. Investing is not a game where the guy with the 160 IQ beat the guy with a 130 IQ. Rationality is essential"- Warren Buffett

Posted By: jstk
Date Posted: 31/May/2007 at 10:26am
It may sound too simplistic but i feel one of the problems with this company is the name , there are too many junk Cyber's in the market ( cybertech systmes, cybermate info, cyberscape multimedia , cyberspace , millenium cyber ).
 
It is more a matter of awareness , information & perception.
 
Cybermedia is a pure Media & Media services company .
 
some of its key subsidiaries are:
 
1) Cyber India Online ltd : 91.95% ( http://www.ciol.com - www.ciol.com )
this is India's 1st IT focussed website to provide quality information to the IT community ( IT professionals, vendors, CIO's, solution providers & CEO's )
 
this link will provide you with more info :
 
http://www.ciol.com/company/ - http://www.ciol.com/company/
 
2) IDC India ltd : 100% ( http://www.idcindia.com - www.idcindia.com )
IDC india is the Indian affiliate of IDC worldwide & its currently India's most comprehensive & dependable resource for market research & consultancy in IT, ITES & telecom with a strength of 25 analysts.
 
this link will provide you with more info :
 
http://www.idcindia.com/about/about.htm - http://www.idcindia.com/about/about.htm
 
3) Cybermedia Dice careers ltd : 49%
this is a technology focussed job portal & a JV with Dice, USA which is a leading provider of online recruiting services for IT & engineering
 
this link will provide you with more info :
 
http://about.cybermediadice.com/ - http://about.cybermediadice.com/
 
4)CyberAstro Ltd : 37.5% ( http://www.cyberastro.com - www.cyberastro.com )
uses the power of the internet to provide advanced personalized astrology services.
 
http://www.globalservicesmedia.com - www.globalservicesmedia.com is a JV with CMP,USA . It is Cybermedia's 1st international foray & a B2B media.
 
The parent company has niche publications mentioned in my previous post. Publishing , as of now is the bread & butter business.
 
http://www.dqindia.com - www.dqindia.com
http://www.pcquest.com - www.pcquest.com
http://www.voicendata.com - www.voicendata.com
http://www.livingdigitalindia.com - www.livingdigitalindia.com
http://www.dqweek.com - www.dqweek.com
http://www.biospectrumindia.com - www.biospectrumindia.com
 
last year, the online business did a EBITDA of Rs.1.3 cr driven by ad spends & monthly page views of 45 million.
 
this year, for the 9-month period online revenues are up approx 35%
 
The company also provides media BPO services ( content outsourcing & distribution ).
 
some of the businesses are nearing the end of investment phase & expected to contribute positvely from 07-08
 
these may seem too many businesses to be in at fisrt glance, but they are all niche focussed , related & to an extent integrated segments .
 
I feel this company can go places.
 
would be nice if Basantjee could share  his views.
 
jayendra
 
 


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If you buy for a non-value reason, you will end up selling for a non-value reason.

Posted By: basant
Date Posted: 31/May/2007 at 10:35am
SUre the name sound prohibitory at elast to me before someone told me what this company does.

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'The Thoughtful Investor: A Journey to Financial Freedom Through Stock Market Investing' - A Book on Equity Investing especially for Indian Investors. Book your copy now: www.thethoughtfulinvestor.in

Posted By: sajanvm
Date Posted: 31/May/2007 at 11:11am
They are on track to do 15Cr EBITDA this year. This is inspite of BPO being a drag since it is a fledgling business. At 8 times EBITDA, stock is certainly cheap.
There is talk that ICICI Ventures is looking to sell their Infomedia stake. The stock has been hitting the circuit regularly. If the stake sale happens, then Cybermedia will be re-rated/discovered.
 


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Sajan

Posted By: basant
Date Posted: 31/May/2007 at 11:15am
Sajan: Your NIIT twins are gong bezerk! How would you rate APtech in this space?

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'The Thoughtful Investor: A Journey to Financial Freedom Through Stock Market Investing' - A Book on Equity Investing especially for Indian Investors. Book your copy now: www.thethoughtfulinvestor.in

Posted By: sajanvm
Date Posted: 31/May/2007 at 11:28am
Basant - I have sold off my NIIT Tech. I am still holding NIIT Ltd (which in turn owns 24% of NIIT Tech). I have never looked at Aptech's valuation, so am unqualified to comment.
 
 


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Sajan

Posted By: jstk
Date Posted: 07/Jun/2007 at 2:45pm
last qtr results were dissapointing , primarily due to
 -losses of around 2 cr in new publication launches
 -higher interest for finnacing acquisition/ working capital
 
http://www.cybermedia.co.in/press/CyberMedia%20Investor%20Release%20FY07.pdf - http://www.cybermedia.co.in/press/CyberMedia%20Investor%20Release%20FY07.pdf
 
most of the new initiatives should gain traction over the next 1-2 years .
 
They have a 58% market share in the IT, technology media space as per a report by 'Pitch "
 
jayendra
 


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If you buy for a non-value reason, you will end up selling for a non-value reason.

Posted By: jstk
Date Posted: 09/Nov/2007 at 1:07pm
qtr 2 results were flattish. As of now, for the half year ended sept 07, on a consolidated basis sales are up by 20% to 55 cr and  np by 20% t0 3.8 cr.
 
importantly, the Media services business has turned around with a small +ve contribution.
 

During the sept qtr, Cybermedia has launched 2 publications:

  • Halsbury Law Monthly targeted at the legal fraternity .
  • Dare, which is a first of its kind magazine  targeted at Enterpreneurs.
i read Dare's first issue and felt it was a pretty ok job for a magazine tackling a new space. It is a 100 page + magazine priced @ rs.30 and  talked about private equity , innovative new business ideas and also lots of experiences of succsesful enterpreneurs like owner of Hidesign, NRM etc.
 
NRM spoke highly about Pradeep Gupta, Cybermedia's MD in the interview.


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If you buy for a non-value reason, you will end up selling for a non-value reason.

Posted By: jstk
Date Posted: 11/Dec/2007 at 9:46am

TV 18's acquisition of Infomedia which values the company @ 445 cr should lend a correct perspective to investors for Cybermedia.

jayendra



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If you buy for a non-value reason, you will end up selling for a non-value reason.

Posted By: basant
Date Posted: 11/Dec/2007 at 10:47am
Infomedia is running stale asets right now TV18 could strategize its various businesses like auto car with the magazine etc. It is now that the management focus comes into play. I am not aware of Cybermedia's management but it has to be aggressive enough to take things in its stride.
 


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'The Thoughtful Investor: A Journey to Financial Freedom Through Stock Market Investing' - A Book on Equity Investing especially for Indian Investors. Book your copy now: www.thethoughtfulinvestor.in

Posted By: jstk
Date Posted: 12/Dec/2007 at 5:02pm

 

 a few small pointers below will underline the basis of my belief in Cybermedia’sManagement quality.   :
 

1) JV’s : All the JV’s / tie ups which Cybermedia has are with world leaders:

a)Dice : no.1 Technology & engineering job portal in the world with 6 month ended june 07 revenues of 650 million USD ( http://www.dice.com - www.dice.com )

b)IDC : no.1 IT, telecom, consumer Technology market intelligence & research services ( http://www.idc.com/ - http://www.idc.com ). 2006 revenues were approx 2.8 billion USD.

c)Lexis Nexis which is a subsidiary of Reid Elsevier, which is world’s leading publisher of information for proffesional users. They did a revenue of approx 7 billion USD & a NP of 1 billion million USD in 2006

http://www.reed-elsevier.com/ - http://www.reed-elsevier.com/

d) CMP media : media and marketing solutions company serving the technology industry ( http://www.cmpmedia.com - www.cmpmedia.com )

 

When Business Week was looking at entering India a couple of years back, they had partnered with Cyberemedia for the same. Unfortunately due to foreign print laws etc, this could not come through.

 

2) around 4 months back, I had called up the Cybermedia gurgaon office  for some clarifications on their quarterly numbers. Although Pradeep Gupta , the MD was in a meeting and I left my number behind, he did call me after half an hour and addressed all my queries most patiently ( with specific answers). Only a handful of top executives would do this for  minority shareholders.

 

3) Management is focused on the future and not on the short term earnings or share price

 

4) I have read many articles where Narayan Murthy , Premji have talked about Pradeep Gupta & his pioneering effort & vision in this field .

Next Gen publishing has also filed draft prospectus with SEBI and i feel the pricing of that issue should further highlight the strength of Cybermedia's brands and the fact that it is an underpriced stock.

jayendra

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If you buy for a non-value reason, you will end up selling for a non-value reason.

Posted By: kulman
Date Posted: 12/Dec/2007 at 5:31pm
 Reid Elsevier.....Wasn't it Infomedia who either bought or formed some JV with them?


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Life can only be understood backwards—but it must be lived forwards

Posted By: jstk
Date Posted: 12/Dec/2007 at 5:45pm
ICICI ventures was in talks sometime in april/may 07 with Reid Elsevier for selling their stake ( which they have now sold to tv18) in Infomedia .
 
cyberemdia's partnesrhip with Reid Elsevier's subsidiary Lexis Nexis  was done 2 months back for the launch of Halisbury's Law monthly.


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If you buy for a non-value reason, you will end up selling for a non-value reason.


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