By Jon Slattery
Tindle Radio has acquired Milestone Group plc’s shareholdings in
Kestrel FM Limited (Basingstoke) and West Berkshire Radio Limited (Kick
FM, Newbury).
Tindle already has substantial minority holdings in and has been represented on the boards of both companies for some years.
Sir
Ray Tindle, chairman of Tindle Newspapers and Tindle Radio, said he was
delighted with the acquisition of majority shareholdings in the
stations and he looked forward to announcing the introduction of a
partner in these stations.
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Meanwhile, one of the pioneers of
commercial radio in the UK, Robert Stiby, is to retire as chairman of
Tindle Radio at the end of March.
Sir Ray appointed Stiby as
chairman in 1999 to develop a specialist company involved in truly
local radio stations. In six years the company has been involved in
five successful licence applications and now owns or operates 10 local
radio stations in the UK and Ireland. In addition it has minority
shareholdings in a number of other small radio stations.
Stiby was a founder director of Capital Radio in 1972 and of Talk Radio.
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He
was founder chairman and chief executive of Radio Investments Limited
from 1972 to 1999, and its operational subsidiary, TLRC, from 1996 to
1999, developing both companies to become one of the leading local
radio operators in ILR through successful licence applications,
acquisitions and strategic investments.
Over the years he had
been a director of over 20 radio stations and has been involved in more
than 30 successful licence applications.
In recognition of his outstanding contribution to radio, he was elected a Fellow of the Radio Academy in 2001.
Stiby said: “I have been in the media business for nearly 50 years. I have loved working in commercial radio. It is addictive.”
Sir Ray takes over as chairman of Tindle Radio.
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