The 'platinum' age
Irineu Marinho created a newspaper in 1911. After 14 years, he also launched O Globo, now one of the most read newspapers in Brazil. It was his son Roberto Marinho, however, who turned the print-based enterprise into a multimedia conglomerate. In the 1940s, the company debuted on the radio. In the 1960s, Globo launched its first TV channel shortly after openly supporting the coup that inaugurated a military regime. The holding consolidated its leadership in the following decade with news programs and telenovelas that remain amongst the most-viewed shows on Globo and Brazilian television altogether. The success led the company to be nicknamed "the platinum Venus." It was only during the second half of the 2010s that Globo started to experience a relative downturn.A twist of fate
Over five decades after its premiere on television amidst nationwide turmoil, the holding saw its main competitors benefit from a political shift. The government of Brazil usually allocated most of its TV advertising budget to Globo, historically the free TV channel with the highest ratings. This changed since President Jair Bolsonaro was inaugurated, with rivals SBT and Record receiving most of the funding. The Federal Court of Accounts eventually forced the government to revert that decision. Regardless, the media conglomerate relies more on other sources of income nowadays. In 2020, 40 percent of Globo's revenue came from selling content. This share tends to increase. Between January 2020 and 2021, the number of subscribers of its streaming service Globoplay skyrocketed by 650 percent.T-commerce & startups
In early 2021, one of Globo's main executives, Paulo Marinho, suggested that the future of the holding founded by his grand grandfather would be in sales through the TV. However, that same year, just two out of five TV sets in Brazil were smart devices, while only seven percent of Brazilians surveyed in 2021 said they used smart TVs for online shopping. On another front, expansion remains part of the conglomerate's strategy. Its new investment firm Globo Ventures focuses both on unicorns – like the Latin American phenomenon Rappi – and startups created by its own TV stars.
