- Fortune, Thursday, March 7, 2013 3:15 PM
Blame Iowa -- and the threat of moving there -- for putting the kibosh on the possible merger between Des Moines-based Meredith and most of Time Inc.'s print titles, writes Fishbowl NY's Chris O'Shea in a partly tongue-in-cheek analysis.
Employees' reaction to the news that the Time Inc. print division is now being spun off from parent company Time Warner is mixed, reports the New York Post's Keith Kelly: “'Some people are relieved, but others are pretty
nervous,' said one insider." There seems to be little remorse about the departure of CEO Laura Lang, though: "In retrospect, the hiring of Lang, who had no publishing experience and was running ad
agency Digitas before she joined Time Inc. in January 2012, proved disastrous," writes Kelly. "Insiders said that Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes grew impatient with publishing because he had lost
confidence in her ability to turn it around."
Fortune senior editor Dan Primack, who of course will be directly affected by the move, had three questions about the split,
including "How much of the independent Time Inc. does Time Warner plan to retain? Remember, this is a spin-out rather than a sale.... Should be interesting to see, given that the
parent company has basically implied that its magazines are more valuable as a tax deduction than as a going concern."
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