With the launch of i, Alexander Lebedev is asking an interesting question: who on Earth decreed that national newspapers need to be fat? At 56 pages, i is vanishingly thin by the standards of Britain’s paid-for national newspaper market. The attractions of brevity are trumpeted on the front page: i is “the paper for today” [...]
Interesting to watch Geordie Greig at Friday’s Value Of Journalism conference, organised by Polis and the BBC College of Journalism. (There’s streaming video of his talk here: you’ll need to poke around a bit to find it, though). Greig seemed tired but spoke well. He was particularly open about the Evening Standard’s economics since the [...]
The OFT’s decision not to investigate Alexander Lebedev’s acquisition of the Independent and the Independent On Sunday tells us that the newspapers generate revenues of less than £70m a year. This brings us closer to solving a mystery. For years, the financials of the Indies have been lumped in with a series of other businesses [...]
Revenue at Independent newspapers has collapsed and owners INM are saddled with huge costs. It won’t be long before Alexander Lebedev secures the national titles for a songIn 1981, Rupert Murdoch paid the equivalent of £34m in today’s money to buy the…
As I suggested yesterday, the fat lady has yet to sing her song at Independent News & Media. This morning’s print editon of the Irish Times carries speculation about a “revised proposal” that Denis O’Brien submitted to INM’s bondholders on Wednesday. Most reports earlier this week treated the INM board’s vote in favour of the [...]
Is everything done and dusted at Independent News & Media? To judge by the press coverage, it looks that way. The O’Reillys appear to have triumphed over Denis O’Brien. We’re told that the bondholders owed €200m will take a 45% stake in the company. Surely, INM’s banks will follow up with the renegotiated debt package [...]
At Independent News & Media, the endgame has kicked off. Denis O’Brien has unleashed his bid to take control of the company. O’Brien wants to cut the O’Reillys out of any refinancing. His backdoor takeover effort may succeed if it offers more to INM’s banks and bondholders than the O’Reillys can muster. The major concern [...]
Should journalists working for Independent News & Media be concerned about the talk of a rights issue that emerged over the weekend and was confirmed this morning? Adjectival flourishes like “emergency” and “deeply-discounted” make the news of INM’s rights issue sound vaguely threatening. Yes, there’s risk involved. But this also looks like the beginning of [...]
Much sturm und drang about that €200m-worth of bonds that Independent News & Media needs to repay by 18th May. Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal opined that Sir Anthony O’Reilly has “less than three weeks to save his global publishing group”. Describing INM as “debt-ridden”, The Australian, also owned by Murdoch, put the company’s doomy legalese [...]