Louisville company grows with deals

By Wayne Tompkins

The Courier-Journal

Cobalt Ventures in Louisville has acquired publishers of Spanish-language yellow-pages directories serving Nashville and the Golden Triangle region of Louisville, Lexington and Cincinnati.

The deals, for an undisclosed sum, continue the investment and real estate development company's venture into Hispanic media. Cobalt is also an investor in Heritage Radio Partners, a Tennessee company that owns Spanish-language radio stations in Louisville and Henry County in Kentucky and three Tennessee cities.

"This is a 40 million (Hispanic) population in the United States - more than the entire population of Canada," said Jonathan Blue, director of Cobalt Ventures. "It's a growing market and a young market. This is one of the ways in which to tap in to that market ... and we want to help other people tap into it."

U.S. Hispanic purchasing power reached $600 billion in 2003, larger than that of any Latin American country, according to Hispanic Business magazine.

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