The German Media Group Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitungsverlag (WAZ) is negotiating the sale of its shares in Serbia with prospective buyers, WAZ Director for Corporate Communication Paul Binder said.
Our decision to leave the Serbian market is final, and there have been no changes in our strategy, he said for the Belgrade-based daily Danas, and confirmed that WAZ general director Bodo Hombach left the position in late January.
The WAZ Media Group holds shares in three Serbia daily newspapers- Politika, Vecernje Novosti, and Dnevnik, the Danas daily writes.
The WAZ has a share of 50 percent in the “Politika Newspapers and Magazines”, a majority share of 55 percent in the Novi Sad- based daily Dnevnik, whereas the exact figure in relation to Vecernje Novosti has not been published and is subject to various interpretations by Serbian and German sources.
In 2011, the WAZ Media Group was a major distributor and seller of newspapers in the Serbian market, as the owner of the
Stampa system, but in May 2011, the company sold that chain of kiosks to the Serbian food producer Centroproizvod.
At the beginning of this year, the WAZ Media Group sold its three dailies in Macedonia, and during 2010, when Hombach first announced that the German media group will pull out of the Balkans, WAZ sold its shares in some major newspapers in Romania and Bulgaria.
The WAZ Media Group remains one of the largest regional publishers in Europe, with around 40 dailies and several hundred various publications and around 15,000 workers.
Source Emg
