Nine and Fairfax merger draws 177 years of Australian media history to a close
The Nine and Fairfax merger sees the end of the Fairfax family’s 177-year association with Australian media, writes Mumbrella’s Paul Wallbank.
When John Fairfax purchased the Sydney Morning Herald in 1841, Fairfax became a national company. It went on to launch the Australian Financial Review in 1953 and cemented its broadsheet portfolio with the acquisition of Melbourne Age publisher, David Syme & Co, in 1983.
The soon to vanish Fairfax Media brand
The acquisition of David Syme was followed by Warwick Fairfax’s debt-funded venture to take control of his great-grandfather’s business. Its eventual failure in 1990, which put the group into liquidation, saw the family lose control. In late 2011, John B. Fairfax sold the family’s remaining 9.7% stake in Fairfax Media for AU$189 million.
In 1993, the company was re-listed on the Australian Stock Exchange as John Fairfax Holdings, with Canadian newspaper tycoon Conrad Black holding 25% of the shares, and Kerry Packer’s Publishing and Broadcasting Limited owning 15%.
Media mergers are a fact of life globally and will continue.
The process is nothing new, just part of an ongoing process to continue to exist.
As audiences fragment and cost pressures on traditional media become untenable,mergers only help to support existing bricks and mortar media companies.
The key part of the merger story is that they are doing this to survive the competition from ” non media” online companies like Google and Facebook.
The online companies who have never truly categorised themselves are the ones that have forced the mergers, created loss of real media jobs and decimated the status quo.
It would be interesting if the online companies came out and declared themselves to be media rather than sitting on the fence.
Also be aware that traditional media have well proven and industry accredited research systems. The numbers are accepted as industry benchmarks.
The same cannot be be said for the big ” non media ” online companies.
Recent audience scandals only serve to back up the questionability of some operators.
The bottom line of this media shakeout is that media specialists are now more than ever in demand to unravel this never ending plate of media spaghetti.