Tamedia made gains in a "very nasty" environment
The Tamedia media group has increased its profits despite the challenging environment. Digital subscriptions are also on the rise. Pietro Supino, chairman of the board of directors, now plans to continue investing in journalism. However, layoffs within the company cannot be ruled out.
Speaking to the media in Zurich on Tuesday, Supino spoke of a "good financial year". This is remarkable, he said, "because things have not become any easier in the industry".
In figures: Tamedia increased its net profit by 39 percent to CHF 170.2 million, mainly thanks to special effects. The operating result increased by over 59 percent to CHF 180.7 million, while total sales fell by 3 percent to CHF 974.2 million.
This result gives us confidence, said Supino, "it motivates us to make new investments in our core business - and that is the
Journalism". Whether this also includes the purchase of the Basler Zeitung, as reported by Schweiz am Wochenende, remains open. Supino only wanted to confirm on Tuesday that talks are always taking place and that, in his opinion, Baz would be a good fit for Tamedia.
Too many staff for new setup
The Chairman of the Board of Directors is more than satisfied with the quality of journalism in his own company. Despite falling revenues, the editorial teams are producing "equally good, if not better journalism". Evidence for this statement is provided by a report on quality monitoring, which was presented for the first time and will be published annually in future.
Under the direction of former Tages-Anzeiger editor-in-chief Res Strehle, experts examined the individual titles. Overall, they awarded good marks. The weak points they cited were too few corrections, a lack of distance from the sources in some cases and a lack of separation between the editorial section and the content.
The 2020 project - the reorganization of the paid newspapers with a joint cover section - is also considered a success internally. The implementation was done perfectly, said Group CEO Christoph Tonini and complimented the editorial team.
However, in response to a journalist's question, Tonini added that too many staff were currently employed with the new way of working. The plan to manage the reorganization through staff turnover remains in place. However, if there are no more natural departures in the next three years, "it cannot be ruled out that there will be redundancies in the future".
"Very nasty" environment
Despite journalistic quality and good results, the media transformation continues unabated. "The environment in the print media market was again very nasty", said CEO Tonini. Tamedia's print advertising revenues fell by CHF 35 million.
On the other hand, digital offerings have increased significantly. Their share of sales rose from 31% to 37.5% within a year. Tonini attributes this to new offers such as the day pass, among other things. Between January and December 2017, the number of digital subscriptions rose from 35,506 to 55,508, including single issues as well as day passes, mobile subscriptions and the "12 App".
Tamedia wants to work together with other Swiss players in digital advertising marketing. This is the only way to counter global players such as Google and Facebook, said Tonini. One such partner could or should be Admeira, he outlined his vision - and added: "However, emotions would probably have to cool down a little before such a collaboration could take place.
Moratorium on terminations
The good result brought employee representatives onto the scene on Tuesday. The professional association Impressum demanded a two-year moratorium on redundancies. In addition, Tamedia should abandon the doctrine of avoiding cross-subsidization and instead finance journalism from the Group's profits. The Syndicom trade union demanded guarantees for the preservation of media diversity and a moratorium on redundancy measures.
In response to a question about the cutbacks at the SDA news agency, Chairman of the Board of Directors Supino said: "We consider SDA to be an important company and we want to remain loyal to it." But it must change in view of the environment in the industry. "We hope that the difficult situation can be overcome in the coming months." In its current structure, Tamedia is the agency's largest shareholder. (SDA)
| Key figures | 2017 | 2016 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| in CHF million | in CHF million | in percent | |
| Tamedia Group | |||
| Operating income | 974.2 | 1 004.8 | -3 |
| Operating result before depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) | 245.2 | 201 | 22 |
| Margin (in percent) | 25.2 | 20 | 25.8 |
¹ as at 31.12.2016
² Equity to total assets
³ Margin refers to operating income
⁴ The average number of employees does not include employees of associated companies / joint ventures.
In the 2017 financial year, the course was set to further expand the offering. "Thanks to these investments, we can now keep up with our international competitors in terms of reach in Switzerland. We want to build on this and offer our advertising customers a 360-degree offering together with Neo Advertising and Goldbach in the future," said Group CEO Christoph Tonini in the press release. (SDA)
