Unsurprisingly, it seems Singapore's Fetch and News Corp Australia were not the only interested parties when APN decided to sell off its ARM regional newspapers business.

A diary item by Michael Bodey and Jake Mitchell in The Australian this week discloses that Fairfax Media chief executive Greg Hywood "hosted News Corp Australia executive chairman Michael Miller, then (ARM) chief executive Peter Tonagh and APN News & Media's Ciaran Davis" at its Pyrmont offices in December, with regional publishing "on the agenda".

While much of the talk was about production and printing, one report puts "the prospect of a three-way merger" between regional newspaper businesses among topics discussed.

Somewhere in there could be a worthwhile formula for the future of print publishing in Australia, but "in the end a lack of clear direction and old rivalries saw little achieved at the meeting," the report says, and APN "took matters in its own hands" with the divestment announcement only a few weeks later.

Despite the report's statement that "News Corp Australia bought APN News & Media's Australian Regional Media newspaper business last month", the issue is not closed: Australian competition watchdog the ACCC has the task of considering the sale, once shareholders have had their say.

And while the ACCC isn't 'on the job' yet, it's not short of advice. Much has been written about the undoubted benefits of the acquisition to the Murdoch empire at a price some see as "a steal".

The December meeting disclosure adds the question of whether ARM need be sold to News to the question of whether the ACCC should allow it.

A lot has happened since 1987 when Rupert Murdoch was told he must divest the business in order to be allowed to buy the Herald & Weekly Times group, which controlled it.

Print newspapers were king; digital and social media - and of course the world wide web - were unheard of. And while daily newspapers today are under specific threat from reduced advertising, and more and more people get their news online, newsmedia companies' share of advertising revenue is not migrating with their audience, and publishers are working to increase circulation revenue to compensate.

Print remains a vital component of publishers' business; News Corp Australia - which sells 8.5 million newspapers a week and distributes another 6.6 million frees - puts the proportion of its publishing revenue attributable to print at 83 per cent.

The 12.6 million people it reaches each month across its print network alone is 70 per cent of the Australian population, and eight out of the country's ten top selling newspapers. That's without adding the 70 titles APN publishes in Australia - mostly up the east coast from Coffs Harbour to Mackay - to its own 140 newspaper titles.

Put simply, printed newspapers are still a substantial business, and if APN can describe as "underperforming", a business which returns in profit, its market value every two years, we'd like to know what they see as a good performer.

Last year's earnings were down 27 per cent, but before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) still amounted to $18.4 million, so the $36.6 million price is a multiple of less than two, compared to some "norms" of seven or eight times.

The reality is that APN has lost interest not just in newspapers, but in newsmedia: With the decision to demerge its New Zealand publishing business NZME, APN News & Media - which will presumably change its name again - will have gone from industry member to become a rival for scarce advertising dollars in the space of a year. Presumably it will also be leaving NewsmediaWorks.

Those who say the decision is a turning point are right. Perhaps another turning point was earlier when the focus of the APN board changed, leading to the appointment of someone with a predominantly radio background as its chief executive.

Another has been cosying up between APN and News, which has seen the latter take a 14.9 per cent share in APN and recruit its former chief executive, Michael Miller as executive chairman.

There's no doubt that APN ARM is a comfortable fit for News - for the complementary geography of its mastheads, as well as for its distribution network - and as ARM chief Neil Monaghan says, it would be good to have an owner that wants the ARM business, rather than one that wants to get rid of it.

But that's not the point.

Rupert Murdoch understands the power and influence of newspapers, and his News businesses play a long and "hardball" game. An example is the way in which it has used its massive strength in the marketplace to progressively weaken competitors such as Fairfax Media, which can now neither expand nor trust for its own future.

Despite recent Victorian closures - and the sale of the Perth Sunday Times to Seven West Media - a professed commitment to print sits alongside a shared dislike of competition which begs the question of whether Murdoch would only be satisfied when he owns every newspaper in every town in the country.

Imagine a possible future scenario, for instance, in which Fairfax has been pushed out of print and possibly out of newsmedia, leaving West Australian Newspapers as the only other major publisher left in Australia, and News as a willing buyer.

Which brings us back to the "single voice" issue.

Auckland-based media researcher and former editor-in-chief of the New Zealand Herald Gavin Ellis says in a piece written for NewsMediaWorks, that the New Zealand assets of Fairfax and APN "will pass largely unnoticed by most consumers into the new entity"... but that's not to say there won't be a difference.

Most readers in ARM's circulation area probably wouldn't notice a difference if News instead of APN owned their local paper either. But two changes are likely: Firstly reduced competition changes the way in which a publisher serves an area, with readers usually suffering as a result.

And secondly - as in much of Adelaide and Brisbane already - they would be subjected to the voice of a single publisher. Over the years, News' editors and others have repeatedly claimed that Murdoch doesn't tell them what their newspapers should say... but isn't that a matter of semantics? They know what the line is on so many key issues, and those in important markets have such access to the boss that the role of top executives might sometimes become difficult or dare we say, untenable.

Over the years, aspiring politicians have got an introduction and perhaps a nod of approval, at global company events attended by top editors and executives. Such an environment may be why a consistency emerges on editorial topics with locally, global warming, the Great Barrier Reef, and the ABC being current examples.

That The Australian has blossomed and bloomed for more than half a century effectively without apparently being much of a profit centre is also perhaps an indicator of the balancing value of its influence and ability to "set the agenda".

The good news is that, while APN settled on its purchaser of choice ahead of the Australian general election, a government decision about it will not be taken until afterwards. The ACCC will apparently not consider the sale until after APN shareholders have voted on it.

Then it will be interesting whether chairman Rod Sims and others with influence on the issue have the courage to say "enough" and restate the limitation which saw the ARM regional newsmedia business being split out of the growing news conglomerate in the first place.

UK politician Anthony Wedgewood-Benn once said that journalism was too important to be left to journalists. And if you trace the history of many newspapers over the years, you will see that most were established not as businesses, but for the influence they could wield.

Always close to the family's heart, the Courier-Mail in Brisbane celebrated its 170th anniversary recently with an eight-page wrapper and a message from Rupert Murdoch, whose father was instrumental in merging the two newspapers from which it gets its name.

But the founder of the Moreton Bay Courier was an aspiring politician, who sought to achieve change and political stature through publishing a newspaper, a business he was later to lose interest in.

If News Corp Australia is allowed to buy APN's ARM division, yet another albeit minority voice will be lost, effectively making Queensland a News monopoly.

So is there an alternative? The situation is slightly different to New Zealand, where both Fairfax and APN wanted to exit the market, and (Gavin Ellis again) "within the media, there will an air of resigned acceptance and the monopoly watchdog Commerce Commission will be persuaded that it is the only available survival strategy".

His verdict is that "significant rationalisation plus the creation of a near monopoly in print" there is the only option, but notes that the failure of APN to either float or sell NZME "at the right price" has been "a reality check for both groups".

But what is "the right price" and how long does it take for that reality check? Assets are likely to include some real estate and printing plants, which being smaller than those scrapped by Fairfax in Sydney - and to a lesser extent, in Melbourne - still have a value. The $36.6 million APN has agreed to accept from News - variously described by Fusion Strategy principal Steve Allen in Mumbrella, and by media columnist Mark Day in The Australian as "a bargain" and "a steal" - may be some way short of the $40-60 million it was hoping for.

But that strengthens the opportunity to get other interested parties - like bidders and watchers at an unsuccessful property auction - back to the table. In the event that the ACCC decides against a sale to News, there's still a great deal to be had.

Peter Coleman

Pictured: An APN ARM map graphic against a background of a few of its mastheads

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