Bassett Pulls Out of Deals
Gail Chiasson, North American Editor
We’ve learned that Bassett Media Group has backed off from buying both Sidetrack Technologies Inc. and Haizou Media Corp., reportedly after concluding that neither was a strategic fit with its operations.
At the end of Aug./09, Bassett announced that it would buy Sidetrack in a share swap deal worth about $3 million, less assumed liabilities. Sidetrack owned and operated full-motion advertising display systems in subway and rail tunnels in San Francisco, Los Angeles, London, Mexico City, Monterrey and Rio de Janeiro.
However, shortly after the planned deal was announced, Sidetrack disappeared from the web and its phone was disconnected. Regular calls to Bassett were seldom returned until about a month ago when we were told by Joseph Arcuri, COO, that the Sidetrack deal was still in the works. Now Arcuri has resigned.
In October, Bassett also signed a letter of intent to buy Haizou Media Corp., which operates advertising screens in China, for approximately $5 million. Haizou seems to be missing from the web as well, and that deal has also fallen through.
Bassett currently operates advertising display companies Impulse Media and Concourse Media.
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