Two partners for the Freie Presse
The daily newspapers NZZ and PubliGroupe are joining forces in the Zurich regional newspaper market. Things are getting tight for Tamedia.
Daily newspapers NZZ and PubliGroupe join forces in the Zurich regional newspaper market. The NZZ Group is taking up the cudgels for newspaper diversity in Zurich, a city of millions. It praises the coup it has landed with PubliGroupe as a contribution to preserving the regional press landscape: The Lausanne-based advertising group is transferring minority shares in Akeret Druck und Verlag (Zürcher Unterländer) and Zürichsee Presse to the previously wholly-owned NZZ subsidiary Freie Presse Holding (FPH). In return, PubliGroupe will acquire a stake in FPH and take over the advertising management for the NZZ and NZZ am Sonntag. According to NZZ editor-in-chief Hugo Bütler, this lays the foundation for a platform that will enable regional publishers to work together on an independent basis. A network is to be created around FPH that will allow various forms of cooperation: in printing, in advertising management, in an article exchange and with or without mutual participation.
"It is clear that we are offering an alternative to the regional expansion plans of the Tages-Anzeiger," says Bütler. The takeover of the Tagi mantle by the Zurich regional papers was previously a strategic option for Tamedia. Following the NZZ Group's acquisition of Zürichsee Zeitung and Zürcher Unterländer, Landbote and Zürcher Oberländer remain. This could also change. "We are now sending out a signal", says Bütler: in addition to the Tages-Anzeiger and the NZZ, there is a third opportunity with FPH to "build something together".
Tamedia remains calm. Group spokeswoman Franziska Hügli assures that a shell contract is only one of the various conceivable strategies. The focus is on the further development of the Tages-Anzeiger. The spectrum ranges from cooperations to the launch of own split editions. Tagi publishing director Maili Wolf emphasizes that her newspaper can "also grow on its own". The decline in circulation in recent years has already been halted.
FPH was founded in the 1970s as the sponsor of the St. Galler Tagblatt, in which the NZZ Group now holds a 70 percent stake. In addition to this share package, the company also holds stakes in the Berner Bund (40 percent) and the Tagblatt der Stadt Zürich (40 percent). Hugo Bütler explains that the majority stake in LZ Medien AG will also be transferred to FPH in the foreseeable future (see also page 18). The size of PubliGroupe's stake in FPH will only be determined once the due diligence evaluation has been completed. In any case, the majority will remain with the NZZ Group.
Stefano Monachesi
"It is clear that we are offering an alternative to the regional expansion plans of the Tages-Anzeiger," says Bütler. The takeover of the Tagi mantle by the Zurich regional papers was previously a strategic option for Tamedia. Following the NZZ Group's acquisition of Zürichsee Zeitung and Zürcher Unterländer, Landbote and Zürcher Oberländer remain. This could also change. "We are now sending out a signal", says Bütler: in addition to the Tages-Anzeiger and the NZZ, there is a third opportunity with FPH to "build something together".
Tamedia remains calm. Group spokeswoman Franziska Hügli assures that a shell contract is only one of the various conceivable strategies. The focus is on the further development of the Tages-Anzeiger. The spectrum ranges from cooperations to the launch of own split editions. Tagi publishing director Maili Wolf emphasizes that her newspaper can "also grow on its own". The decline in circulation in recent years has already been halted.
FPH was founded in the 1970s as the sponsor of the St. Galler Tagblatt, in which the NZZ Group now holds a 70 percent stake. In addition to this share package, the company also holds stakes in the Berner Bund (40 percent) and the Tagblatt der Stadt Zürich (40 percent). Hugo Bütler explains that the majority stake in LZ Medien AG will also be transferred to FPH in the foreseeable future (see also page 18). The size of PubliGroupe's stake in FPH will only be determined once the due diligence evaluation has been completed. In any case, the majority will remain with the NZZ Group.
Stefano Monachesi
