The Baltic News Service (BNS) is the largest

news agency A news agency is an organization that gathers news reports and sells them to subscribing news organizations, such as newspapers, magazines and All-news radio, radio and News broadcasting, television Broadcasting, broadcasters. A news agency may ...

operating in the

Baltic states The Baltic states, et, Balti riigid or the Baltic countries is a geopolitical term, which currently is used to group three countries: Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. All three countries are members of NATO, the European Union, the Eurozone, ...

. Founded in April, 1990, by a group of

student A student is a person enrolled in a school or other educational institution. In the United Kingdom and most commonwealth countries, a "student" attends a secondary school or higher (e.g., college or university); those in primary or elementar ...

s (the founding CEO was Allan Martinson), it sought to inform foreign correspondents in

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

of developments in the Baltic states' struggles for independence from the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

. Within a few months, it had been recognized by numerous

Western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

media Media may refer to: Communication * Media (communication), tools used to deliver information or data ** Advertising media, various media, content, buying and placement for advertising ** Broadcast media, communications delivered over mass el ...

sources. Today, BNS is a

holding company A holding company is a company whose primary business is holding a controlling interest in the securities of other companies. A holding company usually does not produce goods or services itself. Its purpose is to own shares of other companies ...

for separate organizations in

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

Latvia Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of ...

, and

Lithuania Lithuania (; lt, Lietuva ), officially the Republic of Lithuania ( lt, Lietuvos Respublika, links=no ), is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea. Lithuania ...

. BNS disseminates news in Russian and English (as well as the domestic languages of Estonian, Latvian, and Lithuanian) via the

internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

and by other means. Subscribers include media, financial, industrial, and government institutions in the Baltic states. BNS also collaborates with

Agence France-Presse Agence France-Presse (AFP) is a French international news agency headquartered in Paris, France. Founded in 1835 as Havas, it is the world's oldest news agency. AFP has regional headquarters in Nicosia, Montevideo, Hong Kong and Washington, D.C ...

Reuters Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters Corporation. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world. The agency was estab ...

, and

Interfax Interfax (russian: Интерфакс) is a Russian news agency. The agency is owned by Interfax News Agency joint-stock company and is headquartered in Moscow. History As the first non-governmental channel of political and economic informatio ...

. In 2003, the BNS publishing company in Estonia, BNS Kirjastus, bought the bankrupt news agency ETA ( Eesti Teadeteagentuur). BNS was wholly owned by the

Finnish Finnish may refer to: * Something or someone from, or related to Finland * Culture of Finland * Finnish people or Finns, the primary ethnic group in Finland * Finnish language, the national language of the Finnish people * Finnish cuisine See also ...

media group A media conglomerate, media group, or media institution is a company that owns numerous companies involved in mass media enterprises, such as music, television, radio, publishing, motion pictures, theme parks, or the Internet. According to the ...

Alma Media Alma Media Oyj is a Finland, Finnish media and digital service business company. Its best known products are ''Iltalehti'', ''Kauppalehti'', ''Talouselämä'', and . In addition to news services, the company's products provide information rela ...

from 2001 until March 2014 when it was sold to Uudisvoog OÜ, a company fully owned by the Estonian Ilmar Kompus who is also the proprietor of the Sky Plus radio station.Alma Media myy BNS:n
. Press release by Alma Media Oyj, 3 March 2014. (In Finnish.) Later, BNS was acquired by Eesti Meedia (now

Postimees Group AS Postimees Grupp (also known in English as Postimees Group), formerly known as AS Postimees and AS Eesti Meedia, is an Estonian media holding company headquartered in Tallinn. The company is currently owned by MM Group (an investment company ...

), which is owned by Estonian entrepreneur

Margus Linnamäe Margus may refer to: * Margus (name), Estonian given name *Margus (city), a former Roman city at the locality of modern Požarevac, Serbia *Margus River, the Roman name of Great Morava The Great Morava ( sr, Велика Морава, Velika ...

through investment firm MM Group. In late 2015, BNS was effectively joined by

LETA LETA is the main Latvian news agency. Its headquarters are in Riga. It is owned by Estonian entrepreneur Margus Linnamäe through his company Postimees Group. History It was founded as ''Latopress'' in 1919, soon after Latvia became independ ...

(Latvia's formerly state-owned news agency) when UP Invest (a subsidiary of MM Group) acquired most shares in the Latvian agency. To satisfy regulatory concerns, Eesti Meedia sold Latvian BNS operations (subsequently renamed Latvian News Service) and media monitoring service Mediju Monitorings to a third-party Estonian company named AMP Investeeringud on 31 August 2015. Later, it was discovered that most employees of the Latvian News Service and Mediju Monitorings were transferred to LETA, but was not disclosed to the Latvian authorities at the time of the acquisition. On 18 January 2019, the Competition Council of Latvia imposed a €32,200 fine on MM Group.

References

External links

BNS Estonia

BNS Lithuania

BNS Latvia
1990 establishments in Lithuania News agencies based in Estonia Mass media companies of Latvia Mass media companies of Lithuania Organizations based in Tallinn Holding companies of Estonia {{Lithuania-company-stub