Copesa (Consorcio Periodístico de Chile) is one of the more important

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, stretching along a narrow strip of land between the Andes, Andes Mountains and the Paci ...

media Media may refer to: Communication * Means of communication, tools and channels used to deliver information or data ** Advertising media, various media, content, buying and placement for advertising ** Interactive media, media that is inter ...

conglomerates. Copesa is controlled by Álvaro Saieh, a Chilean business man.

Overview

Copesa was launched during the mid-1950s by the wealthy Pico-Cañas family. In the areas of

newspaper A newspaper is a Periodical literature, periodical publication containing written News, 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 poli ...

circulation, El Mercurio and Copesa exert an unchallenged media

duopoly A duopoly (from Greek , ; and , ) is a type of oligopoly where two firms have dominant or exclusive control over a market, and most (if not all) of the competition within that market occurs directly between them. Duopoly is the most commonly ...

in Chile. Copesa's success was largely the work of two prominent members of the Chilean right-wing political and business sector, Álvaro Saieh and Carlos Abumohor. In November 1988, the two investors joined forces with other businesspeople and members of the government to revamp the indebted conglomerate. Saieh became the largest

shareholder A shareholder (in the United States often referred to as stockholder) of corporate stock refers to an individual or legal entity (such as another corporation, a body politic, a trust or partnership) that is registered by the corporation as the ...

with 33% while Abumohor held 16.6%. A month later, in December 1988, Saileh took control of the political magazine '' Que Pasa'', which was incorporated into Copesa. Copesa published the news daily , which is the second most read newspaper in Chile. In 2002, had a daily circulation of about 210,000. Copesa also published three other

periodicals Periodical literature (singularly called a periodical publication or simply a periodical) consists of Publication, published works that appear in new releases on a regular schedule (''issues'' or ''numbers'', often numerically divided into annu ...

for national distribution: the popular magazine , the free daily tabloid , and the newsweekly ''Qué Pasa'', which offered

political Politics () is the set of activities that are associated with decision-making, making decisions in social group, groups, or other forms of power (social and political), power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of Social sta ...

analyses of current events. In 2002, ''Qué Pasa'' had an approximate circulation of 20 thousand readers. Copesa created websites on the

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

for its publications. The publisher also had affiliations with smaller-scale print and digital publishers. One such affiliation was with the digital company that produced "RadioZero," a music Internet site for younger audiences. Copesa also owned Chilean airline Aeronor Chile.

Non-media financial interests

Copesa has financial interests in other areas of the economy. Its investments have been largely channelled into the highly profitable private

pension fund A pension fund, also known as a superannuation fund in some countries, is any program, fund, or scheme which provides pension, retirement income. The U.S. Government's Social Security Trust Fund, which oversees $2.57 trillion in assets, is the ...

s (Associación de Fondos de Pensiones or AFPs) and into real estate (Pena 1998). In 1992, the conglomerate entered into a joint venture with the printing and publishing house Ediciones Chiloé. As a result of this agreement, they established Distribución y Servicios Meta, a company that distributes newspapers, magazines and books. Through this structure Copesa is able to print and distribute its own products.

Notes

{{reflist Mass media companies of Chile Investment companies of Chile Mass media in Santiago, Chile

Overview

Non-media financial interests

See also

Notes