LONDON-British mobile carrier Orange plc said it bought Ananova Ltd., a new media division that includes an animated Internet newscaster, for $142.5 million in cash from the U.K. Press Association. Orange said Ananova provides access to innovative, digital news and entertainment services.
The company, formerly known as PA New Media, shares a name with Ananova, the digitally rendered female newsreader of PA’s real-time news. PA also will provide content to Orange under the deal.
Orange said Ananova exploits text-to-speech technology and provides advanced search capabilities based on Web spidering and personalization and alerting capabilities.
