Latest news with #democratized
CNN
4 days ago
- Business
- CNN
Patrick Soon-Shiong says he will take the Los Angeles Times public
Patrick Soon-Shiong, the billionaire who purchased the Los Angeles Times for $500 million in 2018, said Monday he is taking the ailing newspaper public. Speaking on 'The Daily Show,' Soon-Shiong told host Jon Stewart the newspaper will take the company public over the course of the next year. The billionaire did not clarify when that would happen. 'We literally are going to take the LA Times public and allow it to be democratized and allow the public to have the ownership of this paper,' Soon-Shiong told Stewart. 'We think over the next year we will. I'm working through (that) with an organization that's putting that together right now.' The move follows years of trouble at the Times. In early 2024, The Times cut 20% of its workforce, approximately 115 reporters, following the departure of the paper's top editor, Kevin Merida. In October, the Times came under fire after Soon-Shiong blocked the paper's endorsement of then-Vice President Kamala Harris over Donald Trump for president, prompting the resignation of the paper's editorial board editor, Mariel Garza. Since then, the Times' entire editorial board has resigned, with the last departure coming in February. According to NPR, around 20,000 subscribers canceled their digital subscriptions. Soon-Shiong said the paper has striven 'to have voices of all.' 'Whether you're right, left, Democrat or Republican, you're an American,' he said on Monday. Over the past year, the billionaire has criticized his own paper for what he described as veering 'very left' and said he would balance the paper's editorial board with voices that 'trend right.' The paper has had high-profile missteps in its transformations, such as a briefly-introduced AI-imbued tool that sympathized with the Ku Klux Klan.
CNN
4 days ago
- Business
- CNN
Patrick Soon-Shiong says he will take the Los Angeles Times public
Patrick Soon-Shiong, the billionaire who purchased the Los Angeles Times for $500 million in 2018, said Monday he is taking the ailing newspaper public. Speaking on 'The Daily Show,' Soon-Shiong told host Jon Stewart the newspaper will take the company public over the course of the next year. The billionaire did not clarify when that would happen. 'We literally are going to take the LA Times public and allow it to be democratized and allow the public to have the ownership of this paper,' Soon-Shiong told Stewart. 'We think over the next year we will. I'm working through (that) with an organization that's putting that together right now.' The move follows years of trouble at the Times. In early 2024, The Times cut 20% of its workforce, approximately 115 reporters, following the departure of the paper's top editor, Kevin Merida. In October, the Times came under fire after Soon-Shiong blocked the paper's endorsement of then-Vice President Kamala Harris over Donald Trump for president, prompting the resignation of the paper's editorial board editor, Mariel Garza. Since then, the Times' entire editorial board has resigned, with the last departure coming in February. According to NPR, around 20,000 subscribers canceled their digital subscriptions. Soon-Shiong said the paper has striven 'to have voices of all.' 'Whether you're right, left, Democrat or Republican, you're an American,' he said on Monday. Over the past year, the billionaire has criticized his own paper for what he described as veering 'very left' and said he would balance the paper's editorial board with voices that 'trend right.' The paper has had high-profile missteps in its transformations, such as a briefly-introduced AI-imbued tool that sympathized with the Ku Klux Klan.
CNN
4 days ago
- Business
- CNN
Patrick Soon-Shiong says he will take the Los Angeles Times public
Patrick Soon-Shiong, the billionaire who purchased the Los Angeles Times for $500 million in 2018, said Monday he is taking the ailing newspaper public. Speaking on 'The Daily Show,' Soon-Shiong told host Jon Stewart the newspaper will take the company public over the course of the next year. The billionaire did not clarify when that would happen. 'We literally are going to take the LA Times public and allow it to be democratized and allow the public to have the ownership of this paper,' Soon-Shiong told Stewart. 'We think over the next year we will. I'm working through (that) with an organization that's putting that together right now.' The move follows years of trouble at the Times. In early 2024, The Times cut 20% of its workforce, approximately 115 reporters, following the departure of the paper's top editor, Kevin Merida. In October, the Times came under fire after Soon-Shiong blocked the paper's endorsement of then-Vice President Kamala Harris over Donald Trump for president, prompting the resignation of the paper's editorial board editor, Mariel Garza. Since then, the Times' entire editorial board has resigned, with the last departure coming in February. According to NPR, around 20,000 subscribers canceled their digital subscriptions. Soon-Shiong said the paper has striven 'to have voices of all.' 'Whether you're right, left, Democrat or Republican, you're an American,' he said on Monday. Over the past year, the billionaire has criticized his own paper for what he described as veering 'very left' and said he would balance the paper's editorial board with voices that 'trend right.' The paper has had high-profile missteps in its transformations, such as a briefly-introduced AI-imbued tool that sympathized with the Ku Klux Klan.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Los Angeles Times to Become Publicly Traded Company
The Los Angeles Times will become a publicly traded company, its billionaire owner Patrick Soon-Shiong announced on 'The Daily Show.' 'Whether you right, left, Democrat, Republican, you're an American. So the opportunity for us to provide a paper that is the voices of the people, truly the voices of the people [is important],' Soon-Shiong said. 'So I'm going to announce something with you tonight…that we are going to take LA Times public and allow it to be democratized and allow the public to have ownership of this paper.' More from Variety As L.A. Times and Washington Post Kill Presidential Endorsements, Do Editorial Pages Still Matter? Terry Tang Named Executive Editor of the Los Angeles Times Chuck Philips, Pulitzer-Winning L.A. Times Journalist Renowned for Investigative Reporting on Music Industry, Dies at 71 Soon-Shiong is an L.A.-based surgeon and businessman who invented the cancer drug Abraxane and founded NantWorks, an umbrella company for various healthcare and biotech start-ups. In 2018, he bought both the Los Angeles Times and the San Diego Union-Tribune in a deal worth nearly half a billion dollars. He sold the San Diego paper to MediaNews Group in 2023. Soon-Shiong's leadership at the Los Angeles Times has proved to be controversial among the staff and subscribers. In 2020, he blocked the editorial board from making an endorsement in the Democratic presidential primary (the paper was set to back Elizabeth Warren) but allowed an endorsement of Joe Biden in the general election. Then, in 2024, as the editorial board was set to throw its support behind Kamala Harris in the general election against Donald Trump, Soon-Shiong blocked the endorsement. His decision led to a wave of subscription cancellations and several resignations in protest from esteemed editors and writers. In the past couple of years, Soon-Shiong has expressed a desire to feature more conservative voices at the Los Angeles Times. More to come…. Best of Variety New Movies Out Now in Theaters: What to See This Week 'Harry Potter' TV Show Cast Guide: Who's Who in Hogwarts? Final Emmy Predictions: Talk Series and Scripted Variety - New Blood Looks to Tackle Late Night Staples Connectez-vous pour accéder à votre portefeuille
