BAUER MEDIA PUBLISHER IS LEAVING RUSSIA

The German publishing holding that has been actively developing the Russian media market is leaving the country. The company has withdrawn from the board of founders of the Russian company with the same name. The investors are known to quit due to the property reorganization proceedings.

Until the present, Bauer Publishing House has been the largest publisher in terms of the audience of consumers of manufactured products. The company was engaged in production of more than 80 different periodicals. The most popular among Russian readers were “Secrets of the Stars”, “Oracle”, “Traditional advice” and many others. In 2019, according to the Federal Agency on Press and Mass Communications, the number of publications covered about 9.2 million people.

However, it is worth noting that the process of the company’s leaving the Russian market began in 2015. Then a normative act began to restrict the ability of foreign capital to participate in the activities of the Russian media.

Bauer Publishing House was forced to reduce its participation in the asset structure of a Russian company.

The share of Bauer in the authorized capital of Bauer Media Group LLC was decreased to 20%. The rest of the capital was divided between five leaders. Alexei Ivanov has remained the CEO of the company until recently.

According to the official data, published on the Internet, on 3 June, 2020, the deal was made between the owners of the company, as a result of which Eim Media LLC got a share of 99.9% of its capital. 0.1% remained the property of the Executive Director Muses Monams. At the same time, Eim Media is owned by the same Monams (it owns 40% of the capital) and Alexey Ivanov (60%) on a cost-sharing basis. The amount of the deal on the restructuring of the publishing holding is kept secret. The current majority owner only noted that the finances spent were not borrowed.

Now we can expect the publishing house to be renamed, although by the end of 2020 the company is allowed to use the Bauer Media Group trademark. The experts are still wondering whether the publishing house’s policy will change as a result of the restructuring.

In the recent months, the circulation has dropped, and the revenues from advertising have dropped as well. Whether any projects of the holding will eventually be closed is not known yet.

Alexey Ivanov himself notes that the company has already begun to recover after a two-month period of downturn in business activity and by the end of the year the circulation losses will not be too significant. According to Ivanov, this year the publishing house expects a decrease of 10 million copies.