Schibsted's history

After a long time of conflict, the Independent Media Ownership Council suspended the Norwegian Media Authority's refusal to allow Media Norge. Thus, Media Norge could finally be established, giving a common ownership to Aftenposten, Bergens Tidende, Stavanger Aftenblad, Fædrelandsvennen and FINN.no. Schibsted owns 80,2 percent of the company.

Schibsted acquired the European and Latin American part of this company in July 2006. This consists of classified ad services relating to automotive, real estate, recruitment and private assets which are distributed via print, the Internet, mobile phones and e-mail.

Schibsted bought 66.6 per cent of the company which publishes Moi Rayon (My District), a free weekly newspaper published in St Petersburg, Russia. The newspaper was launched in Moscow during fall the same year. Since April 2009 the Moscow edition is operated as a franchise company and is no longer owned by Schibsted. Under the slogan “Local news”, Moi Rayon publishes news relating to schools, the environment, local council work, shopping and other information that can help to make life easier. The newspaper is published in several local editions.

After 10 years, Schibsted had outgrown its old vision, which had a Scandinavian perspective. There was reason to adjust to the current situation and establish a new ambition: Schibsted is to create tomorrow’s media – today, and be the most attractive media group in Europe.

Svenska Dagbladet and Aftonbladet together launched the Näringsliv24 website, which quickly became the largest business news site in Sweden. It was renamed E24 Näringsliv one year later, when E24 Næringsliv was launched in Norway with Aftenposten and VG as owners. E24 quickly gained the same position in Norway.

As from 3 January, Aftenposten’s morning edition was published in tabloid format, thus breaking the long tradition of a broadsheet format.

Sesam, Schibsted Søk’s new search engine which helps users to find just what they want was launched in November 2005. This search engine uses state-of-the-art technology and aims to make it quick and easy to find the information.

Schibsted became a major shareholder in Sweden’s TV4 by increasing its shareholding to 20.1 per cent. This shareholding was later increased further.

The acquisition of blocket.se – ”Sweden’s biggest Buy and Sell market” – made Aftonbladet a market leader in the field of online classified advertising. At the same time, blocket.se increased its potential by utilising the traffic on aftonbladet.se.

Starting off in Paris in March, 20 Minutes was launched in France in collaboration with France’s SPIR/Sofiouest. A turbulent period followed, since the newspaper printers’ unions went on strike, claiming that this free newspaper was a threat to the newspaper industry. The strike ended after a couple of months and the newspaper was very well received by readers.

20 Min Holding AG bought the majority of the shares in Multiprensa y Mas, a company that already published free newspapers in Madrid and Barcelona. A number of changes were implemented, the distribution system was improved and the circulation figures increased when the newspaper was relaunched under the name 20 Minutos.

After the three main shareholders, Schibsted, Telia and Telenor, agreed to list the company on the stock exchange, the market showed a great deal of interest in subscribing for shares. The share issue of NOK 7.6 million was subscribed for more than five times over.  

This concept, which was developed by Schibsted through extensive research work, was launched in Zurich, Switzerland and Cologne, Germany on 13 December. The idea was to give the readers a concentrated, quick news update and to offer cultural and entertainment guides and service articles. The newspaper quickly received very positive feedback from the readers.

FINN.no, a classified ads portal, was established in October 1999 and soon became the leading classified ads portal in Norway. This company is owned by Aftenposten, Bergens Tidende, Adresseavisen, Stavanger Aftenblad and Fædrelandsvennen.

Through several transactions, Schibsted acquired the majority shareholding in Estonia’s biggest newspaper, Postimees, and also took over Sõnumileht, Estonia’s fourth largest newspaper. By establishing the Eesti Meedia media company, Schibsted became the dominant player in the Estonian media market.

In July of this year, Schibsted bought 73.6 per cent of the shares in Svenska Dagbladet. This newspaper was reckoned to be one of Sweden’s leading nationwide quality newspapers. In the years which followed, Svenska Dagbladet made extensive changes to its product, including the transition from broadsheet to tabloid format.

Schibsted purchased 49.9 per cent of Aftonbladet, which was established in 1830, from the Swedish Federation of Trade Unions and also assumed operational and financial responsibility for the newspaper. That same year, Aftonbladet surpassed Expressen in circulation figures and became Sweden’s largest newspaper. This was also when major changes started to occur in the media world, with the explosive growth of the Internet and other digital media.

Due to the changed market situation and new technological and licence framework conditions, there was a particular focus on developing a long-term strategy. The result was a new vision:

Schibsted's vision is to be a leading Scandinavian media company by being the preferred content supplier to consumers and advertisers, irrespective of their choice of media.

Muttergruppen,  a merger between Swedish companies Meter and Mekano, was purchased by Schibsted in 1995. The next year, Schibsted also bought Metronome Productions in Denmark. The three national production companies, Mutter, Metronome and Schibsted’s Norwegian Rubicon, were then merged to form Metronome Film & Television.

The purchase of a share in Estonia’s biggest private television channel, Kanal 2, was Schibsted’s first step into the Baltic media market.

Schibsted was facing challenges from the new electronic media. Through the acquisition of Oslonett AS, it took a serious step into the new electronic world. Oslonett was renamed Schibsted Nett. This was the year when Schibsted in many ways changed from a newspaper company into a total media company.  

An extraordinary general meeting held on 26 May decided to apply for the company to be listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange. The company was listed on 15 July – with Tinius Nagell-Erichsen as the Chairman of the Group’s Board of Directors and former VG director Kjell Aamot as the CEO. The closing price on the first day was NOK 145.

Major changes took place in the Norwegian press in the 1980s. The expansion of Schibsted’s operations created a need for a different organisation. After many years as a family enterprise, Schibsted became a limited company, established subsidiaries and created Schibsted A/S.

VG was established after the World War II by members of the Resistance Movement. It was first published on 23 June 1945. Following a successful opening phase, the newspaper ran into major financial problems after a while. Aftenposten took over the printing of this newspaper in 1963 but it soon became clear that VG had payment problems. Aftenposten’s owners therefore acquired the newspaper in 1966 and, with new funds, created the basis for a newspaper fairytale. VG became Norway’s biggest newspaper in 1981.

During the World War II, the German occupation forces requisitioned Aftenposten’s printing works capacity in order to publish Deutsche Zeitung and other printed matter. Editors from the Nazi-sympathising National Unity party joined the editorial management in September 1941. Aftenposten was published throughout the war and, after 1945, had to pay NOK 100 000 to the Norwegian state out of the income it had made during the war.

Aftenposten reported for a number of years on the exploration of the Arctic and Antarctic regions. The newspaper also made its mark in the news in 1911 when Roald Amundsen reached the South Pole. Together with Tidens Tegn, Aftenposten had the “exclusive rights” to this news.

Morgenbladet was Aftenposten’s main competitor during this period. A crucial point in the struggle between these two occurred in 1885, when the morning newspaper Morgenbladet also started publishing an afternoon edition. Aftenposten responded by publishing a morning newspaper the next day. From a financial point of view, publishing two newspapers a day was such a strain that it almost broke both newspapers’ backs at one time.

Schibsted lost the contract to print Aftenbladet, a liberal daily newspaper, when this newspaper was sold to a book printer, Fabritius, in Christiania. That meant that Christian Schibsted had lost an important source of income, and his counter-move was the almost immediate launch of Christiania Adresseblad on 14 May 1860. This newspaper was renamed Aftenposten at the beginning of the next year.

Christian Michael Schibsted was orphaned at an early age and grew up in a Christiania Orphanage, where he was trained as a typographer and printer. After working for several printing works, he went into partnership in 1839 with printer Johan J Krohn, who had established a printing business in 1827. 1839 is counted as the year when Schibsteds Forlag was established. Schibsted took over and started to run the printing works as its sole owner in 1843.