Meredith Corp to sell Time media brand to Marc and Lynne Benioff

[September 17, 2018] (Reuters) - Meredith Corp <MDP.N> said on Sunday it entered into a definitive agreement to sell the Time media brand to Marc and Lynne Benioff for $190 million in cash. 

The cover of Time magazine is seen at a news stand at Pennsylvania Station in New York U.S., November 9, 2016. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton

The U.S. media company said the Benioffs were purchasing Time personally and the transaction was unrelated to Salesforce.com Inc <CRM.N>, where Marc Benioff is chairman, co-chief executive and founder.

Marc and Lynne Benioff will not be involved in the day-to-day operations or journalistic decisions, which will continue to be led by Time's current executive leadership team, the company said.

As part of the transaction, Meredith will provide short-term business continuity services and entered into a multi-year agreement with the Benioffs to provide services such as consumer marketing, subscription fulfillment, paper purchasing and printing.

Meredith plans to use proceeds from the transaction to pay down debt and expects to reduce its debt by $1 billion during fiscal 2019.

Meredith acquired Time in a deal valued at $2.8 billion as part of its purchase of Time Inc in January, shortly after which announced it was selling Time Inc's news and sports brands.

(Reporting by Rishika Chatterjee in Bengaluru; Editing by Peter Cooney)

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