JTA to merge with MyJewishLearning

NEW YORK (JTA) — The Jewish Telegraphic Agency and MyJewishLearning announced their intention to merge.

The boards of both organizations signed a non-binding letter of intent to move forward on the merger after negotiating for several months.

A definitive merger agreement is expected later this year.

JTA’s CEO and editor in chief, Ami Eden, will be CEO and executive editor of the combined organization. Meredith Lewis, the director of operations of MyJewishLearning, will be its chief operating officer.

“In the coming months we will have more details to share as the merger is finalized,” Eden wrote in an email to the agency’s client newspapers on Monday night. “For now, we wanted to let you know that this merger will allow us to improve our services to existing readers, provide new audiences with meaningful and informative Jewish content, and strengthen the business side of our operation.”

Founded in 1917, JTA is an international news agency covering developments impacting Jews and Jewish communities in North America, Israel and countries around the world. The JTA website attracts about 300,000 unique visitors per month and the agency reaches millions more syndicating its content to nearly 80 newspapers and websites.

MyJewishLearning was founded in 2002 to spread knowledge of Jewish religion, history, values, traditions and culture. MJL’s websites reach more than 650,000 aggregate unique visitors a month.

According to a news release, the planned merger will allow the organizations to increase revenues and grow readership through the formation of unified and expanded audience development, business development and fundraising teams.

The new organization will maintain its existing brands, including JTA; Kveller, a Jewish parenting website; and Jewniverse.