Christen Ager-Hanssen, the biggest shareholder in the former Johnston Press, has told Prolific North he will sue new owners JPIMedia for damages.
The Norwegian’s Custos investment group has a 25% stake in the publisher, which was bought out of administration by bondholders in a pre-pack deal at the weekend.
Just a day earlier, the 250-year-old company had gone into administration with debts of £220 million.
“First of all I will seek an application to change the administrator,” billionaire Ager-Hanssen told Prolific North. “We need to start a full investigation into what has happened and look at the transaction from the inside.
“This company was not insolvent. The only reason they did this was because I was planning to sack the board. I will then sue the new company for damages. This will 100% go to court. It is a breach of duty by the board because they did not consult their biggest shareholder in this.”
The 56-year-old first bought into Johnston Press in August 2017. He already owned the Metro freesheet in Sweden – the biggest newspaper in the country – and says Johnston Press has fundamentally failed to leverage its audience.
The publisher has more than 200 titles in print and online, including The Scotsman, Yorkshire Post and Sheffield Star, with an estimated 32 million online readers.
Ashley Highfield stepped down as CEO earlier this year after more than seven years at the helm and has been branded a “disaster” by Ager-Hansen.
“Ashley Highfield did zero,” the Norwegian said. “If you have more than 30 million combined readers, you can do anything. Yet they weren’t able to leverage that audience or create new verticals.
“Johnston Press has the brand authority to create new brands and services. With Metro, we created The Student Card, which is super profitable and is about to float.
“We also have the second biggest jobs board in Sweden, much bigger than Johnston Press’s, even though our audience is seven times smaller.
“The journalists at Johnston Press did their part of the deal, because they generated big audiences and were trusted. This is not their fault – it’s the fault of the leadership and commercial team.
“Editorial is there to generate an audience, while the commercial team needs to monetise that audience. Commercial has been a disaster. They didn’t create new revenue streams or services.
“Take the Yorkshire Post. They have a brilliant team of journalists that has the attention of many thousands of people. Then you have to transact with them. Advertising revenue might go down, but you then increase all the other sectors.”
