July 31 (SeeNews) - The Slovenian competition authority, AVK, said it has approved the merger of privately-held news dailies Dnevnik and Vecer, saying it is in line with market regulation.
AVK has issued an approval for the acquisition of daily Vecer by Ljubljana-based investment firm 2HT Invest, Svetovanje in Storitve (former Vecer Group) and Dnevnik, it said in a statement on Tuesday.
You can subscribe to our M&A newsletter here
2HT and Dnevnik submitted their request for market concentration approval in June 2018, AVK said, adding the procedure had taken a long time as their request had to be amended several times.
According to earlier media reports, the merged entity will hold a 40% share of the market.
National daily Dnevnik has a circulation of more than 21,000, while its regional peer Vecer has a circulation of some 19,000, national broadcaster RTV SLO reported earlier this week, adding they plan to continue to be published separately since in the past 70 years Dnevnik has had its readers mainly in the area of Ljubljana and Vecer in the Maribor area.
According to a report by news outlet Siol.net, Dnevnik generated 16.6 million euro ($18.5 million) in revenue last year and 677,000 euro net profit, employing 137 people. Vecer recorded 10.3 million euro in revenue and 500,000 euro in net profit in 2018, employing 122 people.
($=0.8967 euro)