News Corp hopes for broader ad deal with Google

CARLSBAD, USA: News Corp hopes to sell Google Inc access to a greater swathe of its media properties, its executives said, as an advertising deal between the two companies comes up for renewal.

Senior executives at News Corp and its MySpace online service said at the All Things Digital conference on Wednesday that the company was working with Google to try and make their existing advertising deal better for both parties.

"When it comes time to negotiate, one of the things that can be helpful is looking at it from the overall News Corp perspective," News Corp chief digital officer Jonathan Miller said.

The current deal allows Google to run its Internet search ads on MySpace's widely trafficked social media Web site, but is set to expire in about a year and a half, said MySpace CEO Owen Van Natta, who appeared onstage alongside Miller.

According to recent media reports, Google is seeking to renegotiate the deal at a significant discount to the current terms, which popular IT blog Tech Crunch pegged at $300 million a year.

"That's an important deal for us, but it certainly isn't a majority of our revenue," Van Natta said.

News Corps owns a wide range of media properties in television, print and on the Internet. MySpace is the world's No. 2 social network, behind Facebook.