Scottish Radio Holdings (SRH) was a Scottish media company which owned 22

radio station Radio broadcasting is transmission of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based radio ...

s, and around 30 local

newspaper A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as politics, business, spor ...

s in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and ...

and

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel, the Irish Sea, and St George's Channel. Ireland is the s ...

History

SRH had its origins in the 1970s when

Glasgow Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popu ...

was awarded the third licence for a commercial station in the UK. As a result, in 1973

Radio Clyde Radio Clyde is a group of two Independent Local Radio stations serving Glasgow and West Central Scotland. Radio Clyde is owned and operated by Bauer Media Audio UK, Bauer, based at studios in Clydebank, West Dunbartonshire and forms part of Baue ...

began broadcasting. Unlike the two existing commercial stations (both in London), Radio Clyde was an immediate success. This was helped in part by strong financial backers that included

Sean Connery Sir Sean Connery (born Thomas Connery; 25 August 1930 – 31 October 2020) was a Scottish actor. He was the first actor to portray fictional British secret agent James Bond on film, starring in seven Bond films between 1962 and 1983. Origina ...

and

Jackie Stewart Sir John Young Stewart (born 11 June 1939), known as Jackie Stewart, is a British former Formula One racing driver from Scotland. Nicknamed the "Flying Scot", he competed in Formula One between 1965 and 1973, winning three World Drivers' Cha ...

. In 1991 laws controlling the ownership of commercial stations were relaxed. Clyde merged with Radio Forth to form SRH and immediately floated on the

London Stock Exchange London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange in the City of London, England, United Kingdom. , the total market value of all companies trading on LSE was £3.9 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Pau ...

. In 1995 it acquired Morton Newspapers which owned around 20 newspapers in

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label=Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is #Descriptions, variously described as ...

. Since then SRH expanded operations by acquiring further publications in

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to ...

and

. SRH had a network of 22 stations when it was acquired by rival media group

Emap Ascential plc, formerly EMAP, is a British business-to-business media business specialising in exhibitions & festivals and information services. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. History Rich ...

on 21 June 2005. The newspaper titles published by SRH, collectively known as ''Score Press'', was sold to

Johnston Press Johnston Press plc was a multimedia company founded in Falkirk, Scotland, in 1767. Its flagship titles included UK-national newspaper the '' i'', ''The Scotsman'', the ''Yorkshire Post'', the ''Falkirk Herald'', and Belfast's ''The News Letter ...

for £155million. The group's newspaper interests were sold off as were the firm's radio operations in

. SRH's UK radio operations were integrated into those of Emap with the two SRH-owned Vibe FM stations becoming

Kiss 101 Kiss 101 was a radio station in Bristol, England that broadcast to South Wales and the West of England, playing pop, dance, hip hop, urban, R&B and electronic music. The radio station broadcast simulcast to Kiss 100. The coverage was made to ...

and Kiss 105-108. The group's FM stations in

formed a local version of the

Big City Network Bauer Media Audio UK is a UK-based radio division of the Bauer Media Group. History In early 2008, German magazine publisher Bauer bought the radio division of British company Emap, which had been established as East Midland Allied Press in ...

which Emap were already operating in England. Emap also took on SRH's AM stations in Scotland,

Wave 105 Wave 105 is an Independent Regional Radio station based in Fareham, England, owned and operated by Bauer as part of the Hits Radio network. It broadcasts to South Hampshire, the Isle of Wight, West Sussex and Wiltshire, and until September 202 ...

on England's south coast, and two stations in

from SRH. In December 2007, Emap announced that their consumer media interests including radio stations would be sold to

Hamburg Hamburg (, ; nds, label=Hamburg German, Low Saxon, Hamborg ), officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg (german: Freie und Hansestadt Hamburg; nds, label=Low Saxon, Friee un Hansestadt Hamborg),. is the List of cities in Germany by popul ...

based

Bauer Media Group Heinrich Bauer Publishing (german: Heinrich Bauer Verlag KG), trading as Bauer Media Group, is a German multimedia conglomerate headquartered in Hamburg. It operates worldwide and owns more than 600 magazines, over 400 digital products and 50 r ...

References

{{Authority control Companies formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange Defunct companies of Scotland