The situation has been unsettling, with uncertainty prevailing. Sujit's message suggests that once the hubs are established outside the U.S., many of our jobs may be at risk, adding to the current anxiety. Any additional information or insights would be appreciated. Given the stressful circumstances, maintaining transparency is crucial for preserving our sanity.
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Meant to note that the article mentioning Gracenote appeared on Ad Age website. Provide email to read article without subscribing.
There is a very informative article, published 1/24, that contains many insights, including some direct references to Gracenote:
‘Nielsen’s financial pressures also have fueled extensive speculation by investment bankers that the company will divest “non-core” businesses, or those not part of the TV and measurement business, according to three measurement industry executives. Those pieces include such units as NCSolutions, a joint venture with Catalina that tracks the packaged-goods sales impact of TV, digital and other media investments; Scarborough Research, a survey-based insights tracking firm; data integration unit eXelate, and possibly even Gracenote, the heavyweight in metadata linked to the programming catalogs used to track linear and connected TV audiences.
Gracenote is the biggest piece, but also the one that might be hardest to part with. Divesting it, however, could help insulate Nielsen from antitrust allegations, since the company’s refusal to license Gracenote data to TVision is part of the latter company’s antitrust claim. Nielsen similarly ended Gracenote service for VideoAmp last year, though the company portrayed that as a negotiating stance, not a firm refusal, and VideoAmp ultimately found other options, leading users of its data to do likewise.
Nielsen declined to comment on the divestiture speculation.
By the estimate of one measurement industry executive, Nielsen could fetch $2 billion to $2.5 billion by selling all of its non-core assets, including Gracenote, enough to wipe out its highest-interest tranche of bond debt.’
This is only a portion of the full article entitled:
‘NIELSEN PLANS OFFSHORING AND LAYOFFS AS NEW NETWORK DEALS PRESSURE REVENUE’
Sorry for long post, but this provides some ‘big picture’ food for thought.
Heads will roll in Europe too, but it will take them a couple of months to get through all legal procedures for those with permanent contracts for most places.
Nielsen has a lot, A LOT of new job postings for India in particular. Just dozens upon dozens upon dozens. Devs, PMs, Devops, customer relations, data analysts, it’s everything. The only people left in the states will be C Suite people and those VPs who massage client relations. Maybe some commercial folks? or sales? But even then it seems like everything will be off shore, full dev & product teams. For everyone, Gracenote, Analytics Portfolio, main Nielsen, we are all out. It’s just a question of when.
Leadership is very tight lipped about this aspect. But there is a good chance as someone said earlier that any role that can be moved overseas will be moved.
I spoke to my manager yesterday and he mentioned he cannot get into any specifics but there will be changes on the Gracenote side.
Every job that can be moved off shore, will be. find another job. stop thinking you're safe. this isn't about anything other than Nielsen paying debt. Our C suite level people are just figure heads tap dancing.
Australia was probably the test run. More than half of the content jobs went last year there. Anyone in the US who isn’t a senior/manager in content is probably going