A rough economic climate made 2011 a hard year in Britain, both for local business and for local newspapers. But perhaps a problem shared is a problem halved for the two industries, as the Newspaper Society has named the winners of its Local Business Accelerators scheme, which supports new business while promoting local newspaper advertising.

The scheme, launched last year, and described as a "special partnership between your local newspaper and selected businesses in your community", encouraged UK start-ups to apply for a chance to win a three month advertising campaign with their local paper, as well as mentoring from a business expert.

The initiative is backed by Deborah Meaden from Dragon's Den, who will mentor the overall national winner, to be chosen later this year.

The first round of roughly 1,500 winners, who will have their ads hosted by 500 participating local papers, was announced two days ago. The winning companies were congratulated on Twitter by British PM David Cameron, who also acknowledged the local papers that supported the scheme.

After enduring a seven-year decline that has resulted in well over £1bn in ad revenue bleeding out of regional newspapers, Daily Mail & General Trust last week hoisted the white flag over any ambition to be a long-term player in the embattled sector. The publisher admitted it is keen to offload Northcliffe Media, home to more than 100 daily and weekly regional titles from Hull to Bath, and has no desire to put "fresh capital" in and lead what it views as a necessary large-scale consolidation in the sector.

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Publishers Detroit Media Partner (DMP) and Star Media Group (SMD), both owned by Gannett Co., are teaming up with Yahoo for a digital advertising venture that would allow advertisers to place ads on Yahoo's sites to reach audiences within required specifications, IndyStar.com and Freep.com reported today.

"Local advertising continues to be an important area of focus for us, and Yahoo is committed to helping local businesses reach high-quality target audiences," said Lem Lloyd, vice president of Yahoo Americas channel sales, in a DMG press release.

DMP will be offering Yahoo's inventory so that local advertisers can reach a wider user base and so that they look for consumers through enhanced audience targeting (location, demographics, interests), according to press release. John Kridelbaugh, SMG vice president for market development and digital, explained that behavioural and demographic factors could seem more compelling to advertisers than geographic location, IndyStar.com wrote.

Finance company PPF has sold its PPF Media division and shut down its local media project in the Czech Republic, called Naše Adresa ("Our Address"), which created a network of local weeklies across the country.

PPF invested at least Kc200 million (€8.05 million) in Naše Adresa, but the pilot project "did not meet the parameters of return on investment," the group's spokesman told the Czech News Agency (CTK) today. PPF sold its PPF Media company to investor Richard Benysek, CTK reported Friday.

"The pilot project, during which the PPF Media websites operated hyperlocal news and published [print weeklies] in seven regions of the ČR, has not complied with the parameters of commercial return on the PPF targets," PPF stated in a report dated Aug. 27, aktuálnĕ.cz reported.

However, the reason the project was shuttered is being debated.

"It's nonsense. How could it earn something while [in its] preparatory [stage]? How can it earn with a few isolated district weeklies? That was the purpose of the pilot project," a journalist who was part of building the project told aktuálnĕ.cz.

PPF's reason for selling PPF Media is that it wants to take on larger investments, worth at least Kc2.5 million (€100 million). Benysek bought PPF Media because he wants to continue growing the group's portfolio of activities, his PR representative told CTK.