Kilcullen negotiating to buy ‘Business Post’

INVESTMENT company Kilcullen Kapital is in negotiations to buy the ‘Sunday Business Post’ newspaper.

Kilcullen founder and partner Enda O Coineen said “no deal has been finalised” but Kilcullen wants to “invest and help bring the enterprise to its next stage of development”.

He said Kilcullen thinks the newspaper has “a big future” in digital and print publishing.

The newspaper is owned by Key Capital, chaired by former NCB Stockbrokers chairman Conor Killeen.

Key declined to comment yesterday as it emerged that the newspaper’s editor, Ian Kehoe, is to leave his role.

‘Sunday Business Post’ chief executive Siobhan Lennon said Mr Kehoe, inset, who had been in the job since 2014, had “decided to seek a new challenge”.

“Ian leaves the newspaper in a much stronger position than when he was appointed, and I am most grateful to him for his total commitment to the role as editor,” she said.

“We will be running a recruitment process to fill the position as we did for the last appointment. He will however continue to edit the newspaper through his notice period, or until we have a successor nominated.”

The company behind the newspaper swung to a pre-tax loss of just over €520,000 in its last financial year. The figure, covering the 12 months to the end of June last, followed a pretax profit of €5,529 the previous year. Revenue fell 5pc to €7.13m during the period.

The company is operating in a challenging market for print newspapers, with downward pressure on circulation and advertising.