Vultures Are Circling as Time Inc. Gasps
Identity crisis.
Photographer: Neilson Barnard/Getty Images for TIME Inc.Walter Isaacson, the former managing editor of Time magazine,1494936756087 proudly noted in 2013 that Time Inc. was early to the internet. He pointed out that even before the Netscape browser became available in the fall of 1994, back when Time Inc. was the country's most profitable magazine publisher, it was cutting deals with AOL and other "portals" to get its magazines' content online.
Twenty-three years later, Time Inc. is in deep trouble. A public company since 2014, when it was spun off by its longtime parent, Time Warner Inc., Time's market cap is a puny $1.3 billion, half the value of what President Donald Trump loves to call the "failing" New York Times. Its anemic stock price recently dropped $5, to below $13 a share, after it made clear that it would not be putting itself up for sale.