The parent company of the Financial Times is planning to sell its stake in a German business newspaper, write Financial Times reporters Gerrit Wiesmann and Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson.
They wrote, “Pearson is understood to be close to selling its half-share in FT Deutschland, the Financial Times’s German sister paper, to joint venture partner Gruner + Jahr, ending the UK media group’s foray into foreign language newspapers.
“People familiar with the deal said G+J, controlled by German media group Bertelsmann, had beaten natÂional rivals Holtzbrinck and Sueddeutsche Zeitung to satisfy Pearson’s asking price of €15m ($21.9m) to €20m.
“G+J was expected to pay about half up-front and the rest in the form of annual licence fees for the brand ‘FT Deutschland’, which it will control for 10 years. The transaction could be annÂounÂced as early as next week.”
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