Want Want billionaire picks up China Times

Taiwanese billionaire Tsai Eng-meng, CEO of Want Want, has signed a memorandum of understanding with China Times Group. According to local reports, the deal is worth NT$20.4 billion (US$622 million), although a source called the figure “vastly inflated”. Instead, the source pegged the deal at closer to NT$5 billion, about 35 per cent more than what NextMedia CEO Jimmy Lai was thought to be willing to pay. It is also believed that Lai balked at the specific condition that the China Times must continue in its current form for 10 years.

The purchase is believed to include the troubled flagship China Times and its business sibling Commercial Times, along with terrestrial station Chinese Television (CTV) and cable channel CTi. Unlike Lai, Tsai has no background in media, but is thought to be more likely to continue in the strait-laced China Times style. In Taiwan, Lai’s Next Magazine and Apple Daily are known for reporting scandals and titillating photos.

NextMedia is one of the reasons for China Times’ decline. Launched in 2003 and 2004, Lai’s Taiwan publications grew rapidly in circulation and ad pages, while the China Times watched its own slowly fade. Once the most profitable newspaper on the island, its dwindling circulation of 100,000 now ranks fourth in the sector, far behind Apple Daily on 500,000.