The new 2016-2018 industrial plan launched last Friday by the Board of RCS Mediagroup foresees a return to profit as early as 2016. Profits should reach 40 million by the end of the plan, while Ebitda excluding extraordinary items is expected to be around 140 million, doubled compared to the 70 million expected for 2015.
The net debt of the RCS group is seen to fall to 290 million in 2018 compared to the figure below 500 million expected for the end of 2015 and around 400 million expected at the end of 2016. At the end of the plan, the debt will have a ratio of twice the EBITDA compared to the value of 7 expected for this year.
Over the course of the plan, the company estimates an average growth of 1,5% in revenues and a reduction in costs of 60 million euros. From the sales, the group expects to obtain between 110 and 120 million over the course of the plan.
Among the actions envisaged by the new RCS plan, which aim at stabilizing the revenues and margins of print+web+mobile publishing products, is the introduction of new subscription models and, the first in Italy, paywalls to adequately monetize content, get to know and retain the reader.
“By the end of January we will introduce a new payment method for the Corriere della Sera website: the metered paywall. High-quality content has to be paid for. We are the first in Italy”, announced the managing director of the RCS group, Laura Cioli, during the presentation of the new industrial plan to the markets. The metered paywall method is an online meter payment, which starts with a free offer and then moves on to payment.
The industrial plan does not envisage a capital increase of up to 200 million euros, on which the Board has received the authorization to exercise by June 2017.
RCS will also focus on international development, focusing in particular on sport and Spanish-language publishing (through Unidad Editorial, which publishes the newspapers El Mundo and Marca, among others).
