German Media Group Axel Springer To Buy UK’s Daily Telegraph for USD 766 Million
Axel Springer has reached an agreement to acquire the Telegraph Media Group (TMG) for USD 766 million, the companies announced Friday. The deal brings a definitive end to a protracted and often contentious bidding war for the 171-year-old broadsheet, marking a significant shift in the British media landscape as the historic title moves under international ownership.
London, March 6: German media group Axel Springer has agreed to buy the owner of Britain’s Daily Telegraph newspaper for 575 million pounds ($766 million), the companies announced Friday. The agreement ends a long saga over ownership of the Telegraph Media Group, which publishes the 171-year-old, conservative-leaning Daily Telegraph and its Sunday sister paper. Axel Springer said it will invest in the group “to enable it to become the leading center-right media outlet in the English-speaking world" and “turbocharge” expansion into the U.S. market.
“More than 20 years ago, we tried to acquire The Telegraph and did not succeed. Now our dream comes true,” Axel Springer CEO Mathias Döpfner said. The German company owns titles including the Bild and Welt newspapers and the political information group Politico. Downdetector, Speedtest Sold to IT Service-Provider Accenture in Major USD 1.2 Billion Tech Deal.
The agreement follows years of uncertainty over the papers' future and scuttles a rival bid by the owner of the Daily Mail to buy the Telegraph titles. The Telegraph group, previously owned by Britain’s Barclay family, was put up for sale in 2023 to help pay off the family’s debts. There was an offer to buy the publications from RedBird IMI, a consortium backed by RedBird Capital Partners and Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, a member of Abu Dhabi’s royal family and the vice president of the United Arab Emirates.
The consortium pulled out in 2024 following strong opposition from the U.K. government, which launched legislation to block foreign state ownership of the British press. The owner of the right-of-center Daily Mail later made a 500 million-pound offer, but earlier this year the government ordered it be investigated over concerns about the purchase's impact on competition and the “plurality of views” in Britain's media. OpenAI Acquires Software Company Statsig for USD 1.1 Billion All-Stock Deal, Hires Founder and CEO Vijaye Raji as CTO of Application.
Right-leaning news magazine The Spectator, previously part of the Telegraph group, was sold separately in 2024 to British hedge fund investor Paul Marshall.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Mar 06, 2026 07:43 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).