- Date:
- 1961 - present
- Headquarters:
- San Francisco
- New York
- Areas Of Involvement:
- mass communication
- press release
Business Wire
When public relations practitioners want to share news about a company or organization, they may turn to Business Wire to get the word out. Using email, e-releases, multimedia, and other modes of distribution, Business Wire sends brand-related information to a wide network of news outlets, journalists, companies, investors, and social media platforms. This entry first discusses the services provided by the company, including press-release distribution and investor relations solutions. It then discusses the history of the organization.
Co-headquartered in San Francisco and New York, Business Wire offers press-release distribution and investor relations services to companies and organizations interested in reaching news media and syndicators, reporters and editors, consumers, investor financial and news portals, databases, bloggers, social media networks, and other audiences. Mass media communicators primarily use services like Business Wire as a conduit for distributing information—narrow or broad in scope—to media outlets and other communication targets. Companies also can access news and information originated by Business Wire’s in-house news bureau to feature on their own platforms. Both the distribution of and access to business-related information through Business Wire come at a cost to customers.
Press-Release Distribution
Press releases, also known as news releases, are used by companies and organizations to share news with the media as well as the general public. Business Wire’s primary service offers a portal through which a business entity can distribute information via press release to an intended audience. The company promises press-release distribution to a network of 92,000 media outlets in 162 countries as well as the ability to narrow the focus of the distribution based on industry and trade category, location, language, demographics, or audience type (e.g., media, website, blogger). Newsrooms reached through Business Wire press-release distribution include the Associated Press, Dow Jones, Reuters, Agence France-Presse, and Bloomberg.
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Features offered by Business Wire that accompany press-release distribution include company logo displayed at the top of the press release, custom formatting to maximize presentation downstream (i.e., on websites or other media platforms that pick up the news release), tracking and social media monitoring, multimedia display functionality, pull-out quotes, company information, contact information, and recent company stories.
A Business Wire membership is free to customers; cost structures vary per press release, dependent on geographic location as well as word count.
Investor Relations Solutions
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) requires all publicly traded companies to disclose business and financial information regularly. In addition to initially registering as a public company, public companies must file periodic reports and share other information with the SEC on a regular basis so that information can be known to shareholders and the general public. Disclosures consist of everything from an annual report, including the company’s year-end audited financial statements, to proxy statements describing executive compensation and voting matters.
Business Wire’s investor relations solutions are designed to help publicly traded companies stay on track with the disclosures they are required to file with the SEC. The company helps businesses file required information on the Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval system utilized by the SEC. Business Wire also assists companies in sending out press releases and developing secure websites to meet the information needs of investors, analysts, financial media, bloggers, and consumers. Business Wire also has the capability to assist countries outside the United States in meeting regulatory disclosure requirements.
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History
Established in San Francisco in 1961 by Lorry I. Lokey, Business Wire is regarded as a top press-release distribution service along with PR Newswire. Business Wire has about 30 bureaus worldwide and approximately 500 employees. In 2006, Business Wire was acquired by Omaha-based company Berkshire Hathaway as a wholly owned subsidiary.
Business Wire says that it was the first press-release wire service to put up a website, in 1995. In the first decade of the 21st century, it pioneered the use of the Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval software to allow publicly traded companies to file disclosures electronically. The company also eliminated its 15-minute delay, choosing instead to share press-release information simultaneously and thereby equally with the press and general public instead of informing the news media first.
The name Business Wire likely derives from the terms news wires or wire services, which recall the mid-19th-century method of dispatching news via telegraph, sending electrical signals via wire across great distances.
The original version of this article was published by SAGE Publications in The SAGE International Encyclopedia of Mass Media and Society.