Munich-based media company EM.TV & Merchandising has entered into a 50/50 joint venture with Copenhagen-based publisher Egmont to create a new company, Junior.Publishing.

The idea behind EM.TV’s publishing venture is to keep all of EM.TV’s programs under one umbrella brand, and to make sure the Junior brand maintains a high profile, now that the Junior.TV programming portfolio will be broadcast on Germany’s SAT1.’Junior will be all over the place,’ says EM.TV’s Stephanie Schusser.

Junior.Publishing has acquired full access to all licensing rights in Germany, Austria and Switzerland to the Junior program portfolio, with the option to market the rights throughout Europe. This includes 24,000 30-minute episodes of children’s TV programming.

Product dummies for the books will be available at the Frankfurt Book Fair next month. Nine titles will be available for perusal, including: Maya the Bee, The Rainbow Fish, Twipsy, Jim Button, Bear in the Big Blue House, Norman Normal, Flipper, Tabaluga and Pokémon. In addition to property-based reading books, coloring books, picture books and magazines will also be published within the Junior portfolio.

Schusser expects the first of the books to be available by January 2000. Between 50 and 60 books will be released each year, according to the agreement. AD