Japan's media company Nikkei Inc. is to acquire the FT Group from British publisher Pearson Plc for 844 million pounds, or 1.3 billion U.S. dollars in cash, ending the market rumors about the new ownership of the global news organization.
Boosted by the news, Pearson's share price on London Stock Exchange closed 2.07 percent higher than its previous close on Thursday.
PACKAGED ASSETS
The deal comprises the Financial Times newspaper, FT.com and FTChinese.com, and titles such as The Banker and Investors Chronicle, but excludes the FT Group's London property in central London and the Economist stake, announced Pearson Thursday.
For the past few weeks Pearson has been exploring a sale of FT Group, which comprises the Financial Times, a number of related titles and a 50 percent stake in Economist Group, publisher of the Economist magazine.
Pearson said that in 2014, FT Group contributed 334 million pounds of sales and 24 million pounds of adjusted operating income to Pearson. On 30 June 2015, FT Group had gross assets of approximately 250 million pounds.
At the FT, total circulation across print and digital rose more than 30 percent over the last five years to 737,000, with digital circulation growing to represent 70 percent of the total, from 24 percent, and mobile driving almost half of all traffic. Content and services now account for the majority of revenues, said the publisher.
The FT has an editorial team of 500 journalists in more than 50 locations around the world. It was first published as a four-page newspaper in 1888 and was bought by Pearson in 1957.
