The ordeal of Il Sole 24 Ore continues: the presentation of the industrial plan, the recapitalization and also the possible replacement of director Roberto Napoletano has been postponed. In recent days, the CDR had a meeting with the new managing director of the publishing group, Franco Moscetti, from which it emerged that “The presentation of the plan – reads the press release from the editorial committee – has been postponed by a few weeks: it will no longer take place at the board meeting on 24 January, but at a subsequent board meeting to be held in the first half of February”.
The plan will be consistent with a vision of the newspaper which, according to the CEO, it does not foresee Il Sole 24 Ore in competition with Corriere and Repubblica, generalist dailies, being instead a "second newspaper" with a high rate of specialisation. After 15 years of absurd pursuit of generalist newspapers, il Sole essentially seems to want to return to its true job as a newspaper specialized in economics, finance and regulations and taxes, a formula which was at the origin of the successes of the 80s and 90s when it came to surpass the Financial Times in circulation with 430 copies sold every day.
"We have asked that any intervention on labor costs take into account the agreement already in force and the need to enhance the editorial staff, a capital resource in any relaunch perspective", writes the Cdr.
At the CEO, the unions also expressed their utmost concern about the timing and extent of the recapitalization, only announced for now. Moscetti confirmed the shareholder's commitment that he will have to make the resources available to make the plan go ahead, in a logic not only of cuts; however the operation will not materialize immediately. "The issue of liquidity is therefore under the attention of the company's top management who, however, exclude having to deal with an emergency in the short term", report the unions.
Only after the recapitalization will the question of the direction of Il Sole be addressed, with the confirmation or otherwise of Roberto Napolitano, disheartened by a large majority of the editorial staff.
The company and director are also intervening on collaborations, in particular on columnists, aiming to give feedback on the value of the publication. Ergo: drastic cut, even zeroing in some cases, costs, enhancing the importance, for the writer, of a collaboration with a prestigious newspaper. “We have once again underlined the unacceptability of the method followed in cutting agency contracts – they said again from the CDR -. The CEO apologized for the lack of communication; however, he recalled, reserving the right to quantify the extent of the savings obtained for the CDR, that the total costs for the agencies, prior to the end-of-year cancellation, were 2 million and 400 thousand euros ”.
“After what the chairman Giorgio Fossa communicated to the shareholders' meeting on 22 December, we pointed out the need for the company to identify as soon as possible the responsibilities for an at least opaque conduct on a crucial issue such as circulation data. On the story of the inflated copies, Moscetti said that it wasn't just a phenomenon of the Sole 24 Ore, even if we exaggerated in the past. He also underlined the cleaning work done on circulation in recent months and said that on the specific point of multiple digital copies the company is discussing with Ads. The coming weeks will be decisive with the drafting of a new regulation”.
In short, the ordeal of the Sun, over which an investigation by the judiciary for manipulation of budget data is looming, is not over and the road to recovery remains uphill.
