Swiss billionaire joins bidding for Tribune Publishing
Hansjörg Wyss teams with Maryland’s Bainum to make offer on owner of The Capital
An octogenarian Swiss billionaire who makes his home in Wyoming and has donated hundreds of millions to environmental causes is a surprise new player in the bidding for Tribune Publishing, the major newspaper chain that until recently seemed destined to end up in the hands of a New York hedge fund.
Hansjörg Wyss (pronounced Hans-yorg Vees), the former CEO of medical device manufacturer Synthes, said in an interview Friday that he had agreed to join with Maryland hotelier Stewart W. Bainum Jr. in a bid for Tribune Publishing, an offer that could upend Alden Global Capital’s plan to take full ownership of the company.
Alden, which already owns roughly 32% of Tribune Publishing shares, is known for drastically cutting costs at the newspapers it controls through its MediaNews Group subsidiary. Last month, the hedge fund reached an agreement with Tribune, whose papers include The New York Daily News, Baltimore Sun, The Capital and The Chicago Tribune, to buy the rest of the company’s shares at $17.25 apiece.
Under that plan, Bainum, a lifelong Marylander, agreed to establish a nonprofit group that would buy the Sun and two other Tribune-owned Maryland newspapers from Alden for $65 million. Soon after that agreement was reached, however, negotiations between Bainum and Alden stalled. That prompted Bainum, chair of Choice Hotels International, one of the world’s largest hotel chains, to make a bid March 16 for all of Tribune, beating Alden’s number with an offer of $18.50 a share.
That bid valued the company at about $650 million. The Alden agreement valued Tribune at roughly $630 million.
Tribune was not swayed by Bainum’s offer. A securities filing Tuesday revealed that the company’s board recommended that shareholders approve the Alden bid. At the same time, the Tribune board gave Bainum the go-ahead to pursue financing for his higher bid.
He has done just that by teaming with Wyss, who said in the interview that he planned to own the company’s flagship paper while he and Bainum seek benefactors for Tribune’s seven other metro dailies, which include The Orlando Sentinel and The Hartford Courant.
“He made that bid because he wants Baltimore Sun,” Wyss said, referring to Bainum.
The Capital became part of Tribune Publishing and Baltimore Sun Media in 2014. The newspaper group also includes the Maryland Gazette, the Carroll County Times, The Bowie Blade-News and other publications.
There has been intense interest in finding local ownership for The Capital and The Sun, with state lawmakers, county executives and the mayor of Annapolis chiming in to support the idea.
Bainum’s bid was reported to include a plan to make the newspapers part of a growing number of nonprofit news organizations around the county.
As Facebook, Google and Amazon have come to dominate online advertising in the 21st century, newspapers have lost control of what was once a lucrative source of revenue.
Nonprofit news organizations find finding from sources instead of or in addition to advertising. That can include grants and subscriptions.
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