Wealthy Chicago EquityFunder & HealthCareCorp Ownr Bought LATimesGroup: Now LATimes Endorses Hillary

[amborin]

about Michael Ferro:

In December 2011, this wealthy tech entrepreneur became the unlikely lead investor in Wrapports, a holding company formed by a dozen prominent Chicagoans to purchase the owner of the Chicago Sun-Times. (The CEO is former Newsday and Chicago Tribune exec Timothy Knight.) Some $20 millon later, Ferro and company controlled the second-biggest newspaper in the third-biggest city in the nation, the hallowed home of Mike Royko and Roger Ebert and eight Pulitzer Prizes, the epitome of a tough blue-collar underdog.

Turns out Ferro stood at the forefront of a trend. The ensuing months witnessed a flurry of other rich men without media experience snapping up important newspapers—including, in August alone, Red Sox owner John Henry’s $70 million purchase of The Boston Globe and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’s $250 million purchase of The Washington Post.

snip

after a few minutes Ferro appears, sporting a silver-flecked goatee, rectangular Ralph Lauren eyeglasses, an open-necked shirt, and a dark blazer with a subtle windowpane check—a uniform adopted by Silicon Valley hipsters a decade ago. Trailed by a smiling PR rep and by Sun-Times editor in chief Jim Kirk, he pumps my hand once, making a flicker of eye contact before jamming his hands in his pockets and striding toward the door for that breakneck office tour.

snip

With the windfall, he set up his own private equity firm, Merrick Ventures. “I did it because a lot of members of the community came forward and said, ‘We want to work with you in tech,’ ” he says.

Ferro placed one of Merrick’s big bets in 2008, in the midst of another stock-market crash. The firm paid a reported $20 million for a controlling stake in publicly traded Merge Healthcare, a health records and imaging software company that was on the brink of bankruptcy. Ferro became Merge’s chairman, moved its headquarters from Milwaukee to Chicago, and replaced its CEO, among other changes. The market cheered, sending the stock soaring from less than 50 cents a share when Ferro bought in to more than $7 a share by September 2011.

snip

http://www.chicagotribune.com/ct-michael-ferro-chicago-magazine-20131111-story.html

[Skwmom]

1. Where the Clintons are concerned ALWAYS follow the money including who owns the publications that

endorse her and attack Bernie.

[tonyt53]

2. You do realize that most newspaper owners have no idea about what is printed

[BootinUp]

3. Everything fits into the Bern Squad CT. So neat and tidy. nt

[kgnu_fan]

4. Exactly...

[Hoyt]

5. They would have endorsed her anyway, just like darn near every other editorial staff.

Last edited Fri May 13, 2016, 05:58 PM - Edit history (1)

[JoePhilly]

6. And one time, at band camp ...