Seven revises completion date for Pacific Magazines sale to Bauer Media
Seven West Media (SWM) has revised the sale date of its magazine arm to German-owned publisher Bauer Media.
The $40m Pacific Magazines deal will now be completed on 1 May, 2020. The deal was supposed to go through today, after being approved by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) at the end of March.
According to the announcement, no other aspects of the deal have changed. SWM will receive April revenues from Pacific Magazines, meaning the date change will have no adverse effect.
The announcement comes after it was revealed yesterday that SWM has begun court proceedings against Bauer Media to force a completion of the sale. The media company insisted the move was “normal” and didn’t reflect any of the whispers in the industry that Bauer Media was trying to either find a way out of the deal, or cut the price it would have to pay for the business.
The court case was moved yesterday, initially set to take place at the end of April, before being moved to 17 April.
hi – doesn’t that seem to mean though that if the court case is scheduled for 17 April, there are still concerns about the deal going ahead IN ITS CURRENT FORM? Surely Bauer has an issue that they have not been able to agree on and which Seven now wants the court to respond to? Is that not how to read this? The parties doesn’t dispute that the deal will go ahead, it will/should happen on 1 May, but they need the court to intervene on SOMETHING before then. The release says that the terms will not change, but that is as of now. Following the court procedure, that may change. No?
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Until I see a public statement from Bauer confirming this sale is definitely still happening, forgive me for being skeptical. Seems like a delaying tactic and the staff are once again treated with absolute disrespect and disdain.
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It like Days of Our Lives in the publishing industry……..And so the saga continues. Pacific staff are left dangling for another month not knowing if they have a job with Bauer or a job with Pacific for that matter until this whole sale is finalised. With all the other uncertainty that is going on in the world this is not helping, people are anxious and becoming very stressed over this whole saga but at the end of day its all about money and not the people who work for either Pacific or Bauer, they don’t really factor into all this as Pacific would prefer them to just go away so they don’t have to pay them any redundancy !!
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Frankly, I don’t believe all of these media PR bulls. Bauer is methodical and smart as most Germans are. They are currently battling to get out of the deal legally hence it is before the court (Bauer will win through Covid -19 pandemic construed via MAC clauses, which is fair enough in the end, no one gets rip-off) watch..
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lol..the deal has been agreed to be completed May 1 BUT.. why does new court case starts next week hahaha..what for? logic? poor
PR management.. The SWM announcement is actually to buy time to keep the SWM shareholders calm not to create premature panic sell in the stock market throughout the legal stoush about to commence before the court or else SWM stock would tank tremendously like there is no tomorrow. Yes, I agree Bauer will come out as the winner unscathed winning legally and fairly in this battle
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Bet you, Bauer gets rid of the magazine business within three years. NZ has gone and OZ will follow. Everyone may have to go digital for a read in the years ahead. I love the paper.
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