http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/05/AR2007060502467_pf.html
Journalists Seek Murdoch Alternatives
Employees’ Union Implores Billionaires to Bid for Dow Jones
By Frank Ahrens
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, June 6, 2007; D01
The union that represents Wall Street Journal employees is working urgently to undercut Rupert Murdoch’s bid for the paper by trying to drum up interest from other potential buyers. So far, the union’s most hopeful prospect is a Southern California billionaire who is a two-time loser in bidding for newspaper companies over the past two years.
Steven Yount, president of the Independent Association of Publishers’ Employees, said his union has written letters to supermarket magnate and billionaire Ronald W. Burkle, Berkshire Hathaway chief executive Warren E. Buffett and several other rich people, hoping to entice them to bid on the Journal and its parent, Dow Jones.
It’s a strategy that could be described as ABBR (Any Billionaire But Rupert).
“I’m looking for really rich people who have a good conscience,” Yount said in an interview yesterday. “You look for someone who has one billion, two billion, three billion, four billion and might want to put that into a deal.”
The union has written a letter to its targeted group of billionaires. Yount would not say who is on the union’s list other than Burkle and Buffett.
Burkle immediately expressed interest and signed up his private-equity firm, Yucaipa, to advise the union on seeking rival suitors to Murdoch, the union said yesterday. A Yucaipa spokesman declined to comment.
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Mergers & Acquisitions
A Private Dow Jones?
Louis Hau 06.05.07, 5:58 PM ET
Could Dow Jones & Co. go the way of Tribune?
It would be an ironic fate for the company that shares its name with America’s leading stock market barometer, but the union that represents about 2,000 Dow Jones employees may try to take the company private.
The Independent Association of Publishers’ Employees has retained Ownership Associates of Cambridge, Mass., to organize a bid that would counter the $5 billion, $60-a-share offer News Corp. Chairman and Chief Executive Rupert Murdoch put on the table for the company (see: “Game Over?”).
IAPE and Ownership Associates have reached out to a short list of about 10 potential partners, including supermarket magnate Ron Burkle, who’s agreed to join the effort, and billionaire investor Warren Buffett, who hasn’t yet responded, according to IAPE President Steve Yount. Buffett said earlier that he wasn’t interested in Dow Jones.
One possible option would be to take the company private through an employee stock ownership plan, or ESOP, Yount said. Depending on how the ESOP were structured, it could accomplish three different objectives: remove Murdoch from the picture, keep the Bancroft family invested in the company and shield Dow Jones from the pressures of the public markets. The union has said it fears Murdoch would meddle in the journalism at the company.
But scrounging up enough financial might to counter Murdoch’s determination and considerable resources would appear to be an awfully tall order.
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IOW Yount desperately seeks a white knight tool.