Paul Farhi, reporting for The Washington Post, on the sale of the paper to Amazon founder, Jeff Bezos:
Bezos, 49, will take the company private, meaning he will not have to report quarterly earnings to shareholders or be subjected to investors’ demands for ever-rising profits, as the publicly traded Washington Post Co. is obligated to do now. As such, he will be able to experiment with the paper without the pressure of showing an immediate return on any investment. Indeed, Bezos’s history of patient investment and long-term strategic thinking made him an attractive buyer, Weymouth said.
The newspaper industry has struggled adapting to the digital revolution. Bezos, who has been at the forefront of that revolution (see his prescient push into ebooks), seems like the perfect fit. Even better, he can do what he wants without investor influence.