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Johnston Press plc is a multimedia company, headquartered in Edinburgh. Its flagship titles are ''The Scotsman'', the ''Yorkshire Post'' and the ''Falkirk Herald''; it also operates around 250 other newspapers around the United Kingdom, Northern Ireland and the Isle of Man. It is the second-largest publisher of local newspapers in the UK. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE Fledgling Index. ==History== The Johnston family has been involved in the printing business since 1767. The brothers William and Arthur Keith Johnston founded W. & A. K. Johnston Limited in 1826. It bought control of its first newspaper, the ''Falkirk Herald'', in 1846. The company would remain headquartered in Falkirk for the next 150 years. The family publishing company was renamed F Johnston & Co Ltd in 1882, a title it would retain until it was floated on the London Stock Exchange as Johnston Press in 1988.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.johnstonpress.co.uk/ )〕 The company's first major acquisition came in 1970, when it took control of the Fife-based publishers Strachan & Livingston.〔 In 1978 it bought Wilfred Edmunds Ltd in Chesterfield, publisher of the ''Derbyshire Times'' and The Yorkshire Weekly Newspaper Group in Wakefield.〔 The Company bought ''The West Sussex County Times'' in 1988, ''The Halifax Evening Courier'' in 1994 and the newspaper interests of EMAP plc in 1996.〔 Further expansion followed with ''Portsmouth & Sunderland Newspapers'' in 1999 and ''Regional Independent Media Holdings'' in 2002.〔 The Company expanded into the Irish market in 2005 by purchasing Local Press Ltd, a company owned by 3i (£65 million),〔(Newspaper Society Database of Mergers ) (login required)〕 the newspaper assets of Scottish Radio Holdings, known as Score Press with forty-five titles in Scotland and Ireland (£155 million), and the Leinster Leader Group (€138.6 million).〔(Press Release on Purchase of Leinster Leader Group )〕 The titles were then reorganised into three main holding companies: Derry Journal Newspapers (Counties Donegal and Londonderry), Johnston Publishing (NI) (everywhere else in Northern Ireland) and Johnston Press Ireland (along with four smaller companies everywhere else in the Republic). The Company acquired The Scotsman Publications in 2006. On 7 July 2011, NUJ-represented staff at three Johnston Press titles voted more than 90% in favour of taking strike action. The titles involved were the ''Doncaster Free Press'', the ''South Yorkshire Times'', the ''Goole Courier'' and the ''Selby Times''. The dispute stemmed from Johnston Press' announcement in June 2011 of plans to cut 18 jobs including two editors. Following the ballot and the failure to reach a settlement with Johnston Press staff walked out on indefinite strike on 15 July 2011. Despite the strike continuing for several weeks, Johnston Press' Chief Executive John Fry refused the NUJ's request for mediation through Acas. Johnston Press went on to service notice of redundancy upon the ''South Yorkshire Times'' editor Jim Oldfield on 8 August 2011. Graeme Huston, of the ''Doncaster Free Press'' took over management of the paper, becoming its editor-in-chief. The strike continued until 6 September. Ashley Highfield was appointed as CEO in 2011. His strategic vision for the future of the business involved transformational change, implementing a number of strategic initiatives focussed on improving efficiencies and saving costs. These included reducing the number of contact centres from 14 to 2, consolidating the printing sites from seven to three, taking out layers of senior management and reducing the overall numbers of staff. Highfield admitted that whilst some of the cost-saving measures - including a company-wide voluntary redundancy programme - were, at times 'brutal', it meant the debt was reduced from £371.7m to £306m by the end of 2013 and the business was streamlined for greater efficiency. In December 2013 it was announced that Johnston Press had reached an agreement with their lenders as they worked towards reducing the debt. The lenders agreed a revised set of financial targets (referred to as covenants) which run to September 2015. The company's transformation is spearheaded by a digital strategy which has seen its 200 websites relaunch, accelerated growth of its digital verticals portfolio and the launch of new ones including Digital Kitbag, which is a one-stop digital marketing solution for SMEs. Iconic Newspapers acquired Johnston Press' titles in the Republic of Ireland in 2014.〔(【引用サイトリンク】 work = Irish Times )〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Johnston Press」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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