Grupo Imagen
| Industry | Mexican media |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1936 |
| Headquarters | Mexico City |
| Products | Radio, television and print media; Querétaro FC |
| Brands | Excélsior, Imagen, cadenatres |
| Owner | Grupo Empresarial Ángeles |
| Website | imagen |
Grupo Imagen is a Mexican media conglomerate, part of Grupo Empresarial Ángeles.
History
Grupo Imagen traces its roots to the foundation of XEDA-AM in June 1936. This station was acquired by José Luis Fernández Soto in 1962, and in the same year, Fernández Soto founded "Grupo Imagen Comunicación en Radio", which became the operator of XEDA-AM and XEDA-FM. In 1963, Grupo Imagen doubled in size with the acquisition of Radio Metropolitana and its XELA-AM-FM cluster. With these four stations, Grupo Imagen began to form a wide range of programming. While XEDA-FM remained Imagen's flagship with a talk format and XELA-AM continued with its longtime classical music programming, the other two stations changed programming concepts often. In the 1980s, XELA-FM became XHDL-FM "Dial FM", changing formats to rock as "Radioactivo" in the 1990s.
The 1990s also saw the sale of XEDA-AM, then carrying rock music, to Radio S.A., which changed the format to talk. That same year also saw an alliance between MVS Radio and Imagen to operate their Mexico City stations: the group brought together Imagen's XELA-AM, XEDA-FM and XHDL-FM with MVS's XHMVS-FM 102.5 and XHMRD-FM 104.9. When this partnership ended in 2001, Imagen relaunched XEDA with a new news team. In 2002, Imagen dropped XELA's longtime classical format and flipped the station to sports as XEITE-AM (promptly selling it in August of that year), and 2004 saw Imagen drop XHDL's music format for the all-news "Reporte 98.5".
Grupo Imagen was bought by Grupo Empresarial Ángeles, owned by Olegario Vázquez Raña, in 2003. Under GEA's ownership, Imagen acquired stations across the country, began distributing its talk programming to interior Mexico, and made a move into television with the acquisition of XHRAE-TV channel 28 Mexico City. From XHRAE, later renamed XHTRES, the cadenatres network was created.
Also in 2006, Imagen bought the Excélsior newspaper for 585 million pesos and refreshed its branding.
Radio
In Mexico City, Grupo Imagen owns XEDA-FM 90.5 Imagen Radio with a talk format, as well as news-formatted XHDL-FM 98.5 "Reporte 98.5".
Imagen has two syndicated formats: Imagen Radio, syndicated to 17 cities, and RMX, an alternative music format available in five cities and in Mexico City on XEDA-FM HD2.
Two regional Mexican stations, branded as "La Caliente", and XHLTN-FM "Radio Latina" in Tijuana complete Imagen's radio portfolio.
Television
Imagen operates the cadenatres network, which will go national from January 1, 2016 after winning the IFT auction to build a new national broadcast television network, as well as cable channel Excélsior TV, a news-focused channel.
Newspaper
The Excélsior newspaper, owned by Grupo Imagen, is the second-oldest in Mexico City and boasts nationwide circulation.
Other holdings
In May 2014, Grupo Imagen bought Liga MX soccer club Querétaro FC out of government administration.[1] This came after the previous owner of the team was investigated for bank fraud.[2]
