News Corp has announced sweeping staff cuts and major restructures, with executive chairman Michael Miller confirming a number of people will leave the business.
“A number of roles will change and some impacted people will regrettably leave our business,” Miller said in an email to staff on Wednesday.
“I would like to personally thank those colleagues for their contribution and professionalism. We will try to minimise these impacts as much as possible and will treat our affected colleagues with the utmost of respect.
“As we are now living at a time when the way news and information is created and consumed is changing faster than it has ever changed, we too must continue to evolve.”
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Under the restructure, The Australian will be swept into a division headed up by Nicholas Gray as managing director and Michelle Gunn as editor-in-chief. Aside from The Australian, this division will also feature mastheads’ Vogue, The List, and The Wish, and will be titled ‘The Australian and prestige mastheads’.
All the other daily state-based mastheads, such as the Courier Mail, Herald Sun, and the Daily Telegraph, will be under the ‘state and community mastheads’ division with News Corp’s regional and community publications. This division will be headed up by MD/publisher Mark Reinke.
The Daily Telegraph’s current editor-in-chief Ben English will lead editorial across this division, plus the NCA newswire, while The Herald Sun’s Sam Weir will lead the Hobart Mercury and Weekly Times.
The ‘free news and lifestyle mastheads’ division, which will include news.com.au, as well as their Checkout vertical, will be lead by Pippa Leary as managing director and publisher, while Mick Carroll, current editor of the Saturday edition of the Daily Telegraph, and the Sunday Telegraph, will be editor-in-chief.
Jason Scott, currently managing director of news in Queensland, will become executive editor of the Sport Network.
News Corp’s current national executive editor Peter Blunden will step down from this role, but stay on the board and move to a three-day-a-week advisory role. News.com.au’s current editor-in-chief Lisa Muxworthy has been made redundant, along with Editorial Innovation Centre director John McGourty.
News Corp has not revealed how many job losses will occur across the company, but Miller told staff: “Over the next two weeks, we will provide you with more information – and we will inform all of you what these changes mean for you and how teams will operate.”
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