James Ashton: Is a LinkedIn takeover of the Financial Times as crazy as it sounds?
Financial Times editor Lionel Barber spent part of last week kowtowing to his new paymasters, jetting to Tokyo to deliver a speech at the inaugural Nikkei-FT symposium.
Around the theme of Globalisation 2.0, Barber told his audience that Japan had a choice: how far was it willing to open to the rest of the world, interact with other cultures and even embrace English as the dominant language in which to carry out international business?
The FT’s rivals are all hoping that the takeover of the Pink ’Un by Nikkei turns out to be a bit like Abenomics — a much-vaunted experiment that eventually goes wrong.
I don’t think it will, but that hasn’t stopped Bloomberg staffing up in London and News Corp splashing money on new apps to target the City.
In truth, I think Nikkei will be an owner just as benign as Pearson — as long as Tokyo and London are speaking the same language.
What is instructive is a conversation I had with one media owner, who most feared a takeover of the FT by LinkedIn.
That’s right, the website where professionals polish their CVs in full view of an army of recruitment consultants. Surely some mistake?
Yet LinkedIn has already transformed into a publishing platform, favoured by some executives as the place to post their “thought leadership” musings.
It has also expanded by acquisition, last year buying training website Lynda, which lets its paying subscribers enrol in courses so they can list new skills on their CVs.
The FT would have been a powerful addition to the fold.
Given that Amazon tycoon Jeff Bezos bought the Washington Post and Alibaba’s Jack Ma acquired the South China Morning Post, it is a reminder that tomorrow’s newspaper owners could spring from anywhere.
