GB News investor Paul Marshall seals £100m deal to buy Spectator
Sir Paul Marshall has sealed a £100m takeover of the Spectator magazine as the backer of GB News completes the next stage of his ambition to control a significant swathe of the UK’s conservative and rightwing media outlets.
Marshall, the hedge fund tycoon who also owns the UnHerd website, is also in the running to buy The Daily and Sunday Telegraph with the second round of bids by prospective buyers due by 27 September.
The tycoon, a backer of the often controversial GB News TV channel which launched three years ago, has acquired the politically conservative magazine through his Old Queen Street Ventures vehicle.
Marshall has been in exclusive talks to buy the world’s oldest magazine for the past month.
The sale represents the first stage in recouping the £600m paid by RedBird IMI – the consortium backed by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed al-Nahyan, the vice-president of the United Arab Emirates and owner of Manchester City football club, and the US investment firm RedBird Capital Partners – which took control of Telegraph Media Group in November last year from the Barclay family.
However, the deal was referred to UK regulators over press freedom and competition concerns.
RedBird IMI was forced to put the Spectator and Telegraph titles back up for sale in the spring after the British government published legislation to block foreign states or associated individuals from owning newspaper assets in the UK.
The sale of the Daily and Sunday Telegraph is being run separately, and RedBird IMI last month whittled down the shortlist of potential buyers for the next round of bidding.