Latest news with #newspaper
Zawya
6 hours ago
- Business
- Zawya
Los Angeles Times plans IPO, billionaire owner says
The Los Angeles Times newspaper plans to go public within the next year, its owner Patrick Soon-Shiong said in a television interview, aiming to give the public ownership of the 143-year-old publication. "We're literally going to take LA Times public and allow it to be democratized and allow the public to have ownership of this paper," Soon-Shiong said on "The Daily Show" in a taped interview with the host, Jon Stewart, on Monday. The billionaire owner of the newspaper said the model would resemble the public ownership structure of the NFL's Green Bay Packers and that a partner organization was working on the structure. The effort would be led by a new diversified media company called the L.A. Times Next Network, aimed at "rebuilding trust in media" by combining verified information, technology, and community participation, the newspaper said in a statement on Tuesday. "The Network consists of five coordinated pillars: the Los Angeles Times; LAT Next, a curated creator platform; Nant Games, focused on esports and civic/scientific gaming; NantStudios Virtual Production, oKering real-time virtual production capabilities; and L.A. Times Studios, supporting streaming, live events, and forums," the statement added. The initiative will pursue a novel Regulation A+ financing structure led by investment bank Digital Offering, which the company said would allow readers and supporters to become shareholders. The move follows months of turmoil at the Los Angeles Times. Last January, the paper laid off at least 115 staff, or more than 20% of its newsroom, amid continued financial losses and leadership exits, including Executive Editor Kevin Merida and Managing Editor Sara Yasin. At the time, Soon-Shiong said the paper was losing $30 million to $40 million annually. The paper's editorials editor also resigned last year after Soon-Shiong reportedly blocked a planned endorsement of then-Vice President Kamala Harris, triggering subscriber backlash. Soon-Shiong, who is also the founder of ImmunityBio , bought the LA Times along with other newspapers in 2018 for $500 million from Tronc. (Reporting by Surbhi Misra in Bengaluru; Editing by Lincoln Feast and Jacqueline Wong)
New York Times
7 hours ago
- Business
- New York Times
Alden Global Capital Makes a Play for The Dallas Morning News
MediaNews Group, the newspaper operator owned by the investment firm Alden Global Capital, put in a bid on Tuesday to buy The Dallas Morning News, a last-minute twist in the sale of a publication that has been locally owned for 140 years. This month, the media conglomerate Hearst agreed to acquire DallasNews Corporation, the parent company of The Dallas Morning News, in a deal valued at $75 million, or $14 a share. That deal has been approved by the boards of each company and was expected to close later this year. MediaNews Group is offering $16.50 a share, or roughly $88 million, for the company, according to a letter to the DallasNews board that was disclosed in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. MediaNews Group urged the board to consider what it said was a superior offer. It also said it would ensure that the print edition of the newspaper continued. 'We have been considering a potential transaction with DallasNews for several years,' MediaNews Group wrote in the letter, 'because we are consistently impressed with its commitment to high-quality local journalism supported by operational efficiency that maximizes resources available for the newsroom.' MediaNews Group is a subsidiary of Alden Global Capital, an investment firm that has bought dozens of newspapers around the country, often cutting costs by shrinking newsrooms through layoffs. It is the second-largest newspaper publisher in the company, with publications like The Denver Post, The Boston Herald and The San Diego Union-Tribune. According to the securities filing, MediaNews Group has purchased nearly 10 percent of DallasNews stock. Under the Hearst deal, The Dallas Morning News would join Hearst Newspapers, which operates 28 daily newspapers, including The San Francisco Chronicle. Hearst has been acquiring publications in Texas and in February reached a deal to buy The Austin American-Statesman from Gannett. MediaNews Group does not own any newspapers in the state. A spokesman for DallasNews declined to comment. A representative for Hearst did not immediately respond to a request for comment. DallasNews is a publicly traded company, but has retained the structure of a family-owned business. Robert Decherd, a descendant of the paper's founder, is the controlling shareholder. The Dallas Morning News has faced the same headwinds as other local newspapers, such as declining advertising revenue and a struggle to reach profitability. It offered buyouts to staff in 2023 and recently sold its Plano, Texas, printing plant. According to a recent article, the newsroom has 157 employees. Colleen McCain Nelson was recently named executive editor. She is expected to start in the role in August.
Bloomberg
8 hours ago
- Business
- Bloomberg
General Atlantic's Kotzin Sees IPOs Taking Off in 2026
Hi, it's Swetha Gopinath in London, getting a global IPO outlook from a senior executive at private equity investor General Atlantic. Also today, the billionaire owner of the LA Times plans to take the newspaper public. Today's top stories
CTV News
10 hours ago
- Business
- CTV News
Billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Times says he will take the newspaper public in the coming year
LOS ANGELES — Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, the billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Times since 2018, said this week that he intends to take the newspaper public in the coming year. During an interview on Monday's 'The Daily Show With Jon Stewart,' Soon-Shiong said the move would allow the Times 'to be democratized and allow the public to have ownership of this paper.' Soon-Shiong said he's working with 'an organization that's putting that together right now.' He didn't identify the organization or say whether the deal would involve an initial public offer to sell shares of the company or another investment arrangement. 'Whether you're right, left, Democrat, Republican, you're an American. So the opportunity for us to provide a paper that is the voices of the people, truly the voices of the people, is important,' he said. Soon-Shiong, a biotech billionaire, acquired the Times as part of a $500 million deal, returning it to local ownership two decades after the Chandler family sold it to Tribune Co. Soon-Shiong's purchase raised hopes after years of cutbacks, circulation declines and leadership changes. But like much of the media industry, the Times has continued to face financial difficulties, losing money and subscribers. Last year the company said it would lay off at least 115 employees — more than 20% of the newsroom — in one of the largest staff cuts in the newspaper's history. At the time, the news organization said it had fallen well short of its digital subscriber goals and needed a revenue boost to sustain the newsroom and its digital operations. In January 2024, executive editor Kevin Merida suddenly stepped down after a 2 1/2-year tenure at the newspaper that spanned the coronavirus pandemic and three Pulitzer Prizes, as well as a period of layoffs and contentious contract negotiations. Then in October, the editorials editor resigned after Soon-Shiong blocked the editorial board's plans to endorse Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris for president. Mariel Garza told the Columbia Journalism Review in an interview that she quit because the Times was remaining silent on the contest in 'dangerous times.'
Daily Mail
13 hours ago
- General
- Daily Mail
EUAN MCCOLM: Thirty years ago I had my first clash with a member of the 'lanyard class'. Sadly, it was only a taste of things to come
It was supposed to make my life easier, but within an hour I was the most loathed man in the room. Thirty years ago, while working as a reporter for a newspaper in the North-East of England, I was compelled by my employers to attend a 'stress management' course. Over two days inside a stuffy meeting room at St James' Park, I would be taught techniques to make me happier and more efficient. The course leader decided to begin proceedings with a general knowledge quiz. This, he said, would place us in a real-life stress situation. The quiz was not in the slightest bit stressful. The aftermath, on the other hand… I came top in the quiz, by some distance. I'm not saying my fellow stress managers were idiots but I'm hardly the fizziest drink in the fridge and I didn't get a question wrong. Having marked myself out, by knowing the name of the capital of Brazil, as having airs and graces, I was treated with suspicion by the others. Over the following two days, we sat in that airless room listening to a man with the most punchable face I'd ever seen suggest a variety of ways in which we might reduce our stress levels. What he did was this: every night, as he drove home, he'd pass a service station a mile from his house. At this point, he would tell himself that he was no longer in 'the work world'. If this wasn't enough, he might light some candles and have a long soak in the tub. Reader, I am what you might call a smart-a*** and so I took great pleasure in irritating this charlatan, who was being paid handsomely so that my bosses could tick a box that said they were doing the right thing by their staff. When he asked whether, if I was in a plane and the engines died, I'd parachute to safety, I played it deadpan. 'Dunno,' I said. 'But if you don't, you'll die,' he said. 'I get that,' I replied. 'It's just I don't know whether, in the moment, I'd be able to jump.' 'But the plane's going to crash,' he continued, his exasperation mounting. 'Yeah, I know,' I said. 'And I hope I'd be able to do it but, you know, how can I say I would?' I was annoying everyone in the room by this point. A woman from advertising sales snapped that she'd jump and the course leader told us all this was evidence that, under terrible pressure, the human mind can find reserves of strength. I went for lunch alone on the first day and then let the afternoon drift past in a hoppy haze. On the second day, the stress management expert managed his stress by ignoring me. When I returned to my desk after two days of sessions, my news editor demanded to know what stories I had for the coming Sunday's paper. Well, none, I said. I've been on a stress management course. Under pressure to catch up, I felt more stressed than before. It isn't healthy to hold grudges but, three decades on, my contempt for the man who ran that course has only intensified. He was at the vanguard of the trend for employers to bring in consultants and workshoppers. Rather than creating genuinely comfortable working conditions and paying decent wages, companies could run a series of expensive – and pointless – courses and declare themselves committed to the Government's 'Investors in People' scheme. The contemporary equivalent of those consultants are the activists who, over recent years, have been let loose across the public and private sectors to conduct courses on equality and inclusion. Just as my bosses didn't give a hoot about my stress levels 30 years ago, today's employers don't care about the damage these consultants cause. This lanyard-class is perfectly personified by Isla Bumba, equality officer at NHS Fife. In evidence last week during the tribunal of Sandie Peggie – suing the health board and trans-identifying doctor Beth Upton for sexual harassment and discrimination after she was suspended for complaining about the presence of a biological male in a female-only space – Ms Bumba exposed the vacuity of these box-tickers, employed to ensure their employers comply with whichever target or objective is currently in vogue. In the case of Ms Bumba – a £60k-a-year equality officer with seemingly no understanding of the Equality Act – this meant giving advice that not only left Sandie Peggie victim of a shocking witch-hunt but also left her employers, funded by the Scottish taxpayer, open to costly legal action, such as the tribunal now taking place. But the hapless equality officer cannot be a scapegoat for her employers. The chief executive of NHS Fife, Carol Potter, and the board –chaired by Pat Kilpatrick –must all go. And they must go as publicly as possible. This is not only necessary for the good governance of NHS Fife, it is essential if the grip of gender ideologues on public bodies is to be loosened. Carol Potter, Isla Bumba, Pat Kilpatrick and every member of the NHS Fife board must become examples of what happens when those in authority ignore their responsibilities to both employees and the law. Right now, lurking in offices across Scotland, there are overconfident and under- qualified men and women who hold in their hands – and seem indecently eager to exercise – the power to destroy careers. These people, with their courses and their talk of 'best practice', are a danger. Fortunately, there already exist robust equality laws which, among other things, protect the sex-based rights of women. There should be no need in any organisation with a functioning legal department to employ someone to ensure compliance with the law, especially when that individual doesn't have the faintest idea what they're talking about. For decades, workplaces have been invaded by clipboard-wielding, power-tripping consultants and experts who – in order to justify their salaries – make life unnecessarily difficult for the rest of us. Once you've clashed with one of these exhausting little tyrants, no number of stress management courses will help you forget.
