Hearst magazines are now offering group discounts through a platform designed Group Commerce, beginning with Road & Track and Car and Driver. AllThingsD reports that the deals will later be offered in other magazines, like Marie Claire, Esquire and Cosmopolitan. The discounts will be found in the magazines themselves, but also in each magazine’s online presence.

The Hearst Corporation has agreed to buy 102 publications from French company Lagardère in a deal that is worth $890 million. Lagardère has been wanting to shed their international operations and focus more on their domestic business. Heart will become the second largest domestic magazine as a result of the deal. Hearst will gain the American edition of Elle, Car and Driver, Road & Track, and Woman’s Day.

Hearst Corporation is rumored to be buying digital ad company iCrossing for $375 million. iCrossing would earn additional bonuses if reaching certain targets. “While going through the process of evaluating iCrossing’s position in the market, we have spoken with, and entered into, non-disclosure agreements with many companies,” stated iCrossing spokesperson Dana Mellecker. Hearst is the parent company of 15 newspapers and 14 magazines. [Reuters]

Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) and Hearst Magazines have partnered to create a new food portal called Delish.com.  The has recipes for food and cocktails.  Delish also links to blogs and news articles that revolve around food.  Advertisers that have already signed with Delish.com includes Hellman’s, Knorr, Bertolli Frozen, Simply Orange, and Kraft.

“Delish.com is very serious about the subject of food, but our writers,
bloggers and overall editorial slant also look at the cultural and
whimsical side of what we’re all eating,” stated Chuck Cordray, VP and GM of the Digital Media division of Hearst Magazines. “Together with MSN, we developed Delish.com to go way beyond a typical
recipe site. We are confident that consumers will come to us for both
information and entertainment.” 

Delish.com is available through the MSN homepage.  The advertising inventory for Delish.com will be controlled by Microsoft Advertising.  Hearst is the parent company of magazines such as Cosmopolitan, Esquire, Good Housekeeping, Marie Claire, and Seventeen.

Yesterday a 10-Q was filed with the SEC.  The 10-Q was regarding MediaNews Group and The Hearst Corporation buying 80% of classifieds web site, Kaango.  The cost of 80% ownership was roughly $20 million. 

MediaNews Group is the fourth largest newspaper company and is headquartered in Denver, CO.  MediaNews represents roughly 58 daily newspapers and 100 non-daily publications.  Acquiring partial ownership of Kaango was a vertical integration strategy for MediaNews.  MediaNews Group signed Kaango last June to provide their newspaper companies a classifieds platform.  This is the same case for The Hearst Corporation who also previously signed Kaango for a classifieds platform deal as well.

“Kaango will be held by a newly formed LLC, which is 50 percent owned by each of the two. The remaining 20 percent of Kaango is owned by its founders and is subject to a call option and is expected to be purchased in the future, the company said,” wrote Rafat Ali [paidContent].

This transaction reminds me of when eBay Inc. bought 25% of classifieds website, Craigslist in 2004 from shareholder that was a former Craigslist employee.  Clearly the classifieds market on the Internet is still hot and is acquisition-ready.

Worldwide Biggies is a new digital entertainment website that was started by Albie Hecht. Hecht is best known for his work on Spike TV and Nickelodeon. For example, he produced shows like Clarissa Explains It All, Rugrats, Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius, etc.   Hecht also oversaw SpongeBob SquarePants and Blue’s Clues.  Now Hecht is making a comeback full force and has raised $9 million in Series A from NBC Universal, Platform Equity, Greycroft Partners, Hearst Corporation, and Prism Ventures.

“The production studio creates content that’s directed for a multi-platform distribution model, offering content to be streamed online, on mobile phones, television, film, and consumer products. Covering all its bases, Worldwide Biggies is looking to attract the entire gamut of advertisers, regardless of what type of campaign medium they’d like to try their hand for^[1],” wrote Kristen Nicole of Mashable.

Worldwide Biggies is based in New York and has also struck a deal with TMZ.com.  From what I understand, TMZ, is working with Worldwide Biggies to create a website called StarVsStar, a fantasy betting-like league for celebrity controversies.

Worldwide Biggies was started in 2005 and the funding that the company received seems to be consistent with other recent funded-comedy website launches like FunnyOrDie and NationalBanana.

References:
[1] Mashable: Worldwide Biggies Funded by NBC and Hearst
[2] Red Herring: NBC Funds Worldwide Biggies

Hearst Magazines Digital Media announced today that they have officially acquired eCRUSH.com, Inc. eCRUSH is a social network for teens and adults. Through the acquisition, Hearst Magazines also gains other Internet properties, eSPIN and HighSchoolStyleBoard.

“We are thrilled to become a part of Hearst’s incredible network of teen brands and believe that it’s the perfect fit for the eCRUSH audience, as well as for our advertisers,” stated Amy Gibby, president of eCRUSH.com.

eCRUSH launched on February 14, 1999 (Valentine’s Day) and has matched 900,000 people through its 2,400,000 registered users. eSPIN is based on the popular Spin-the-Bottle game played by teenagers. The intention of eCRUSH is for the youth to flirt and make new friends online while respecting anonymity. eSPIN-the-Bottleâ„¢ has 1 million active users and is continuously growing.

HighSchoolStyleBoard is a photo-rating website targeted towards the youth as well. HighSchoolStyleBoard ranks users based on Best Smile, Best Hair, Most Goofy, Best Dressed, Most Emo, Most Preppy, Hottest Overall, etc. just like a high school yearbook.

Although financial details were not disclosed, I believe that it is north of $1.4 million since eCRUSH’s EBIT for 2006 was that amount. In February, Hearst is planning on launching three new teenager web companies and magazines including CosmoGIRL.com, Seventeen.com, and Teenmag.com.