Posted by chicagomedia.org on September 28, 2009 at 18:42:53:
Sun-Times may have 2nd bidder, union boss says
By: Ann Saphir
Sept. 28, 2009
(Crain's) - Move over, James Tyree: At least one other investor is considering bidding for Sun-Times Media Group Inc.
Thomas J. Thibeault, executive director for the Chicago Newspaper Guild, the union that represents journalists in the Chicago Sun-Times newsroom, declined to identify the investor beyond saying the person is "in the know in the financial world," is from Chicago and appears to be serious about putting a bidding group together. "They reached out to the union first," he said in an interview Monday.
A second bidder would represent competition for Mr. Tyree, CEO of Mesirow Financial Inc., who this month agreed to buy the company for about $26 million, pending steep concessions from the Guild on compensation and work rules. A bidding process that begins this week opens the field to rival would-be acquirers.
Sunday is the deadline to submit a bid for the Chicago-based media company.
Five Sun-Times Media unions, all of which represent journalists, have rejected Mr. Tyree's concessions. Four other units - representing press operators, paper handlers and others - have voted to approve the concessions, and seven unions have yet to put the terms to a vote.
Mr. Thibeault says that concessions demanded of the Guild are more onerous than those imposed on other unions and would effectively "gut" their contract.
Bankers at New York-based Rothschild Inc., which ran Sun-Times Media's sales process since it filed for bankruptcy protection March 31, said in court filings that of the more than 20 potential investors who received a confidential look at the company's financial materials, only one - Mr. Tyree - submitted an offer.
"At this time, the company has no other bidders," a Sun-Times spokeswoman said Monday afternoon. "We are absolutely open and willing to speak with any prospective bidders. We would invite the Guild to share the identity of their bidder so we can follow up promptly. Time is of the essence."
Mr. Tyree said Monday he wasn't aware of another bidder.
But Mr. Thibeault said he remains hopeful, even amid ongoing discussions over the concessions that Mr. Tyree has demanded. "They could be coming out of the woodwork," he says of the potential for still more bidders to emerge.
Recent cost cuts have slowed the cash bleed at the company, but it is still losing hundreds of thousands of dollars a week amid the kind of steep declines in ad revenue that also helped push rival Tribune Co. into bankruptcy court last year.
Mr. Tyree had said he would withdraw his bid if all 16 bargaining units didn't agree by Tuesday, but a Delaware Bankruptcy Court judge later scrapped that deadline, ruling that Mr. Tyree can't demand quick concessions to seal the deal and noted that the sale doesn't have to close until December. The judge said that if Mr. Tyree walks away two or three months before closing, he would be liable for not acting fairly and in good faith.
An auction set to take place next week appears to be Mr. Tyree's deadline to secure the concessions he seeks or the deal is in trouble.