Grupo Multimedios is a Mexican media conglomerate with holdings in broadcast television, radio, publishing and entertainment.
The company is headquartered in
Monterrey
Monterrey ( , ) is the capital and largest city of the northeastern state of Nuevo León, Mexico, and the third largest city in Mexico behind Guadalajara and Mexico City. Located at the foothills of the Sierra Madre Oriental, the city is anchor ...
.
History
Multimedios was founded in 1940 when Jesús Dionisio González acquired
Monterrey
Monterrey ( , ) is the capital and largest city of the northeastern state of Nuevo León, Mexico, and the third largest city in Mexico behind Guadalajara and Mexico City. Located at the foothills of the Sierra Madre Oriental, the city is anchor ...
radio station XEX, where he had formerly worked, for 12,500 pesos. After World War II, the Mexican government requested the XEX callsign to build a
national clear-channel station, and González selected the
XEAW call letters, which had formerly belonged to a station in
Reynosa, Tamaulipas
Reynosa () is a border city in the northern part of the state of Tamaulipas, in Mexico. It is also the municipal seat of Reynosa Municipality.
The city is located on the southern bank of the Rio Grande in the international Reynosa–McAllen Met ...
. In the 1950s, the group became known as ''Organización Estrellas de Oro'' ("Gold Stars Organization"), which in the 1990s changed its name to ''Multimedios Estrellas de Oro'' and later Grupo Multimedios.
Multimedios entered the television business in 1968 when it launched
XHAW-TV channel 12 in Monterrey. Further expansion would come in the 1980s and 1990s when the federal government made available dozens of new radio and TV stations, leading to Multimedios establishing a broadcast presence in cities including
Tijuana
Tijuana ( ,["Tijuana"](_blank)
(US) and [< ...]
,
Chihuahua, and
Tampico
Tampico is a city and port in the southeastern part of the state of Tamaulipas, Mexico. It is located on the north bank of the Pánuco River, about inland from the Gulf of Mexico, and directly north of the state of Veracruz. Tampico is the fifth ...
.
Media holdings
Radio
Multimedios owns 37 radio stations and operates another five. The station portfolio is primarily concentrated in northeastern Mexico, including 14 stations in Monterrey; through a combination of acquisitions, operating agreements and stations won in the IFT-4 auction of 2017, Multimedios has increased its presence in the state of
Veracruz
Veracruz (), formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave), is one of the 31 states which, along with Me ...
and in western and central Mexico. In addition, Multimedios owns three radio stations in
Costa Rica
Costa Rica (, ; ; literally "Rich Coast"), officially the Republic of Costa Rica ( es, República de Costa Rica), is a country in the Central American region of North America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the no ...
, which it acquired in 2018 in its purchase of Grupo Latino de Radiodifusión from
PRISA and Grupo Nación, and Top Radio 97.2 in
Madrid
Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), and ...
.
Broadcast television
Multimedios entered the television business in 1968 when it launched
XHAW-TV channel 12 in Monterrey. In the 1980s and 1990s, the television network expanded to a regional footprint centered on the states of
Coahuila
Coahuila (), formally Coahuila de Zaragoza (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Coahuila de Zaragoza ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Coahuila de Zaragoza), is one of the 32 states of Mexico.
Coahuila borders the Mexican states of N ...
,
Nuevo León
Nuevo León () is a state in the northeast region of Mexico. The state was named after the New Kingdom of León, an administrative territory from the Viceroyalty of New Spain, itself was named after the historic Spanish Kingdom of León. With a ...
and
Tamaulipas
Tamaulipas (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Tamaulipas ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Tamaulipas), is a state in the northeast region of Mexico; one of the 31 states which, along with Mexico City, comprise the 32 Federal Entiti ...
. In the IFT-6 station auction of 2017, Multimedios obtained six additional concessions for television stations in
Mexico City
Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital and largest city of Mexico, and the most populous city in North America. One of the world's alpha cities, it is located in the Valley o ...
,
Guadalajara
Guadalajara ( , ) is a metropolis in western Mexico and the capital of the list of states of Mexico, state of Jalisco. According to the 2020 census, the city has a population of 1,385,629 people, making it the 7th largest city by population in Me ...
,
Puebla
Puebla ( en, colony, settlement), officially Free and Sovereign State of Puebla ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Puebla), is one of the 32 states which comprise the Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided into 217 municipalities and its cap ...
,
Ciudad Juárez
Ciudad Juárez ( ; ''Juarez City''. ) is the most populous city in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. It is commonly referred to as Juárez and was known as El Paso del Norte (''The Pass of the North'') until 1888. Juárez is the seat of the Ju ...
,
Durango
Durango (), officially named Estado Libre y Soberano de Durango ( en, Free and Sovereign State of Durango; Tepehuán: ''Korian''; Nahuatl: ''Tepēhuahcān''), is one of the 31 states which make up the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico, situated in ...
and
Monclova
Monclova (), is a city and the seat of the surrounding municipality of the same name in the northern Mexican state of Coahuila. According to the 2015 census, the city had 231,107 inhabitants. Its metropolitan area has 381,432 inhabitants and a ...
, representing a major expansion into central Mexico.
On July 29, 2017, Multimedios launched a separate television channel in Costa Rica, on channel 44, through a licensing agreement with the Fundación Internacional de las Américas.
Additionally, Multimedios owns cable news channel
Milenio Televisión
Milenio Televisión is a Mexican television cable news channel owned by Grupo Multimedios. The news programming uses the resources of the Milenio newspaper, one of the largest in the country. Programming is 24 hours a day, through news, analysis ...
, which shares resources with its ''Milenio'' newspaper.
Print
Jesús Dionisio González started the ''Diario de Monterrey'' newspaper in 1974. On January 1, 2000, the newspaper began publishing in Mexico City and became a national daily, renamed ''Milenio'' (Millennium). The company also publishes several magazines.
Out-of-home advertising
Grupo Pol is an out-of-home advertising company with a presence in Mexico and other Central American countries.
Sports
Multimedios entered the sports ownership realm with its acquisition of 50 percent of the
Sultanes de Monterrey baseball team in February 2017, with the other half held by Mexican baseball legend
José Maiz García. The company grew further in sports in 2018 by buying the
Fuerza Regia
The Fuerza Regia de Monterrey (''Monterrey Royal Force'' in English) is a Mexican professional basketball team based in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, Mexico playing in the Liga Nacional de Baloncesto Profesional (LNBP). They currently play their home gam ...
of the
Liga Nacional de Baloncesto Profesional
The National Professional Basketball League ( or LNBP) is the top professional basketball league in Mexico. The league was founded in 2000 with 10 teams. Despite its short history, the LNBP has established itself as the one of the most important ...
as well as four LNBP expansion franchises and by becoming a majority shareholder of the
Bravos de León
The Bravos de León (English: León Braves) are a professional baseball team in the Mexican League based in León, Guanajuato, Mexico.
History Cachorros de León (1979–80)
Mexican League baseball in León began in 1979 when the Alijador ...
baseball team, a move that allowed the club to play in 2019. They have sold the team since.
Other holdings
Other Multimedios holdings include real estate company Altea Desarrollos; three Spanish wineries, Lleiroso, Bodega de Sarría and Inversiones Vitivinícolas, with a combined output of 7.5 million bottles of wine a year; the ''Bosque Mágico'' (Magic Forest) amusement park in Monterrey;
In 2015, Comercializadora Jubileo, a Multimedios subsidiary previously dedicated to the creation of toys for amusement parks, obtained a contract with the state government worth 538 million pesos to build a water treatment plant. A new state government rescinded the contract in 2016. The Nuevo León Attorney General's Office later claimed that Jubileo had been awarded the contract despite its lack of prior experience in water treatment and failure to meet bid requirements.
Former holdings
Cable television
Multimedios previously owned 50 percent of Televisión Internacional, S.A. de C.V., which traded as Cablevisión Monterrey. Cablevisión provided cable and internet service to the Monterrey metropolitan area. In 2016, Multimedios sold its stake to the other 50-percent owner, Televisa, and Cablevisión Monterrey was subsumed into
Izzi Telecom
Izzi Telecom is a Mexican telecommunications company owned by Grupo Televisa and operated by Empresas Cablevisión, S.A.B. de C.V. It is listed on the Mexican Stock Exchange under the code CABLE. izzi provides telephone, Internet, cable TV and ...
.
Movie theaters
The MMCinemas chain of movie theaters, founded in 1981, was sold off in 2006 and then sold in 2008 to
Grupo México
Grupo México is a Mexican conglomerate that operates through the following divisions: Mining (Minera Mexico), Transportation ( GMxT), Infrastructure and Fundacion Grupo Mexico.
Its mining Division is the leading Copper producer in Mexico and t ...
, which rebranded all of its units as
Cinemex
Cinemex is a Mexican chain of cinemas. It operates multiplexes in cities such as Mexico City, Guadalajara, Monterrey, Toluca, Cd. Juarez, Leon, Tijuana, Mexicali, Puebla and other Mexican cities.
In 2015, Cinemex began to expand into the United ...
.
References
External links
* {{Official website, https://www.multimedios.com/
Television broadcasting companies of Mexico