iVillage, one of the earliest websites for women, will be folded into Today.com next spring, TVNewser has learned. The news of the dissolution of the standalone site is the second such move today. As TVNewser reported earlier, NBCLatino.com will be folded into NBCNews.com, eliminating three positions.
The iVillage changes will results in the loss of up to 12 jobs.
“Combining these strong lifestyle brands under the ‘Today’ banner will give iVillage much bigger reach and will further integrate it with NBC News,” a spokesperson tells TVNewser. “We are actively trying to find roles for those affected elsewhere in the company.”
iVillage was founded in 1995 by Candice Carpenter, Nancy Evans, Robert Levitan, and Tina Sharkey as one of the first Silicon Alley startups and one of the first websites targeted to women. The company had a high-flying IPO in 1999, when shares reached $100, only to crash in the dot com bubble two years later.
NBC Universal acquired iVillage in 2006. In 2007-2008 NBC produced two successive but unsuccessful iVillage-themed TV shows for local stations. Last year, the site moved from the NBC Entertainment digital group to the NBC News digital group.
Under new NBC News president Deborah Turness there is more emphasis on integrating digital and broadcast assets. The iVillage and NBCLatino moves come as the head of NBC News digital Vivian Schiller departs NBC for Twitter.