Evolving media market

Organization

As of 1 January 2009, Edipresse Switzerland’s management team, under the leadership of Theo Bouchat, will evolve with the goal of putting into place a more simplified structure and organization.

The main decision consists of creating a single Editorial Director position, which will be entrusted to Eric Hoesli, currently Director of Edipresse’s Regional Publications.

Eric Hoesli will be assisted in this assignment by Peter Rothenbühler (presently Editor in Chief of the Le Matin newspaper), who will become Deputy Editorial Director.

Cost-cutting measures

Globally, advertising expenditure in printed press is down and is becoming increasingly unpredictable. Furthermore, changes in the behaviour of readers are also impacting revenues.

In order to deal with this situation and to anticipate future developments, Edipresse Switzerland has decided to optimize its operations and lower costs.

The optimization programme’s objectives are to cut Edipresse Switzerland’s overall costs by CHF 20 million in two years (2009-2010), thus representing approximately about 6% of total costs and to reinforce the strengths and competences of the organization. These measures are to be undertaken across the entire company.

Such a reduction cannot remain without consequences on the number of employment positions. To start with, in September 2008, 50 positions will be eliminated. Taking into consideration non-replaced natural departures and early retirements, the number of terminated positions will be limited to 25. A planned redundancy scheme is foreseen.


For further information:

Sylvia Wuersten

Manager Corporate Communications