November 9, 2006
Billionaires Fight to Buy The Los Angeles Times
By GERALDINE FABRIKANT and SHARON WAXMAN
LOS ANGELES, Nov. 8 — David Geffen spends more time schmoozing with an elite cadre of journalists than just about any other mogul in Hollywood.
The billionaire often invites them to his sprawling estate in the heart of Beverly Hills, where De Koonings and Pollocks hang on the walls. In September, his guest was Leo Wolinsky, a managing editor of The Los Angeles Times, and they broached the delicate question of whether Mr. Geffen might try to buy the struggling newspaper.
If Mr. Geffen gets his way, he will be spending a lot more time with journalists.
Lately his name has been prominently linked with a potential purchase of The Times, fueled in part by his recent sale of hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of paintings from his world-class collection.
In addition, his wooing of Mr. Wolinsky, with whom he has a continuing dialogue, has made him a favorite potential owner among many top editors.
But if he wants the nation’s fourth-largest newspaper, he will have to fight for it.
Two rival billionaires, Eli Broad and Ron Burkle, joined forces Wednesday to make a bid for all of the Tribune Company, to get their hands on The Times. The details of the bid were not released, but like Mr. Geffen, they have said they want the paper not just for financial gain, but also to invest in an imperiled civic institution.
On Tuesday, the Tribune Company, with a market value of $7.7 billion, dismissed The Times’s top editor, Dean Baquet, who had declined to make further newsroom cuts. Mr. Geffen declined to comment for this article. Indeed, he has not yet spoken publicly in detail about his desire to buy the paper.
But the man with a record of stellar success in pop music, theater and contemporary art, along with a reputation for “blind ambition,” “ferocious drive” and “ruthless single-mindedness,” as observed in a detailed biography of him by Tom King published in 2000, has told friends and colleagues that buying The Los Angeles Times is his next major goal. Mr. Geffen, a Democratic activist, has indicated he would be willing to accept lower profits at the newspaper so he could invest in making it world class.
Because of Mr. Geffen’s singular clout — his enormous influence in Hollywood, his multibillion-dollar fortune, his political activism — many of those who know him well wonder what kind of owner he would be.
While he cooperated initially with Mr. King, the late Wall Street Journal reporter who wrote “The Operator: David Geffen Builds, Buys and Sells the New Hollywood,” Mr. Geffen stopped speaking to the reporter when he became unhappy with the direction of the book.
He bombarded the publisher, Random House, with phone calls and a visit from his lawyer, Bert Fields, to complain about the book’s accuracy ahead of publication. In the end, Mr. Geffen, whose aggressive manner often intimidates friend and foe alike, could not produce evidence of his claim that the book was inaccurate or dishonest, as he said at the time. ...
The Los Angeles billionaires are part of a growing trend of wealthy local executives interested in buying newspapers from chains that have seen their stocks fall as readers and advertisers migrate to the Internet. The former chairman of General Electric, John F. Welch Jr., has expressed interest in acquiring The Boston Globe. ...
Carl
_________________________________________________________________ Stay in touch with old friends and meet new ones with Windows Live Spaces http://clk.atdmt.com/MSN/go/msnnkwsp0070000001msn/direct/01/?href=http://spaces.live.com/spacesapi.aspx?wx_action=create&wx_url=/friends.aspx&mkt=en-us