Two great conspiratorial minds analyse the Lebedev purchase of the Evening Standard, or Standard. First Peter Preston:
It matters hugely to Lebedev whether he has to compete against the Lite and Murdoch’s thelondonpaper. (The signs are that he will.) It matters hugely to Associated to know whether a Lebedev Standard would turn itself into a morning paper, competing directly with the Mail and Metro. It matters personally to Rothermere to understand whether selling the Standard would also hand Wapping victory in the freesheet wars. It matters mightily to James Murdoch to understand whether the Lebedev deal would destroy any immediate prospect of News International winning a chunk of the Standard in an eventual peace deal. Everything connects.
And then the excellent Richard Addis:
With losses at £18m a year the Standard might be prised away. With his son in law Matthew Freud helping to direct the Lebedev campaign, one assumes Murdoch would have known about the plan to buy the Standard. But it would be absolutely vital for him to stay absolutely out of the picture otherwise it would never get sold.
Once time has gone by and the contractual restraints that Lebedev will probably have to sign have expired, one might imagine the Lebedev/Freud Standard would move closer to the Murdoch camp, at any rate enough to stop assisting London Lite.
London Lite then becomes another drain on the Associated resources. It has to be closed down. If Murdoch can force Metro into making losses — another victory.
Meanwhile the FT finds DMGT’s CFO, Peter Williams, out of love with newspapers.
“We are so much more than a newspaper company,” Mr Williams concludes.
“To be honest, we don’t see this [proposed Evening Standard deal] as a hugely significant event.”
And Roy G has yet more interesting detail on Evening Press Ltd.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
The final link, to Roy G, is broken – it’s got your URL in as well as the one you want to point to.
Thanks Seamus – fixed it!