Speaking yesterday to mark this week's launch of monthly magazine Spectator Business, Neil also revealed the new title was profitable from the first edition, if its small share of overheads is excluded.
Neil is now keen to work on further Spectator brand extensions and is making a trip to India next month to talk to possible local partners.
But he admitted that India's downside concerns its press laws that allow foreign companies to own just 25% of current affairs titles, and so a Hong Kong edition may be more likely. The South China Morning Post could be a partner for the latter. Asked whether Dubai figured in his plans Neil said the magazine was too "upmarket" for the territory.
Spectator Business could have been born much earlier, according to Neil, who claims he had the idea three years ago of rebranding Press Holdings' struggling business weekly The Business, but was dissuaded by his colleagues.
"True," said Martin Vander Weyer, the Spectator Business editor who also edits The Spectator's business section.
Spectator Business is the fourth incarnation of what began as Sunday business newspaper The Sunday Business in 1996. It is the first one to be profitable from the first issue, thanks to a free distribution, mainly built on controlled circulation.
Having changed The Sunday Business to The Business, and then into a weekly magazine, which all fell short of their break-even circulation, Press Holdings made another change, taking it off the newsstand.
The magazine is now a free monthly and is sent to a controlled circulation of 30,000 investor and business readers, with a further 9,000 distributed through Eurostar and five-star hotels in London and 3,000 to existing subscribers to The Business.
The first edition booked £75,000 worth of advertising and the second edition is set for a "similar" total, according to Nick Spong, group advertising director .
Spectator Business also has an online presence on the Spectator website.
Further Spectator UK spin-offs, such as arts, travel and drinks editions, are on the cards as well as foreign editions according to Neil. But not every one should be assumed as being controlled circulation, he said.
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