Positions that become vacant in the Group should not be filled.
(Photo: Reuters)
Dusseldorf With Pro Sieben Sat 1, another media group is cutting jobs in Germany. The Munich-based television group wants to cut around 400 jobs in Germany – that corresponds to around ten percent of full-time jobs. The company announced on Tuesday that the job cuts will affect employees in the company’s headquarters and entertainment division.
“The job cuts is a difficult but entrepreneurial decision that is necessary so that Pro Sieben Sat 1 can increase its earning power and grow sustainably and healthily again,” said CEO Bert Habets. He reiterated that layoffs for operational reasons should be avoided as far as possible. For example, vacancies should not be filled.
The former RTL manager Habets wants to get the company and its TV stations Pro Sieben, Sat 1 and Kabel 1 back on the road to success by cutting costs and concentrating on the entertainment business. The job cuts are intended to save costs in the mid double-digit million range by the coming year.
Pro Sieben Sat 1 is in a difficult situation. The advertising markets are stumbling as a result of high inflation and the weak economy, In Germany in particular, companies are very reluctant to advertise. This applies particularly to private broadcasters. Industry experts do not expect a recovery until the second half of the year.
For the fourth year in a row, the company is operating in an extremely challenging economic environment, according to Habets, who has been head of Pro Sieben Sat 1 since the fall. “It is therefore essential that we significantly reduce our material and personnel costs.” Most recently, around 120 full-time positions were lost in 2019.
In addition, Pro Sieben Sat 1 is struggling with home-grown problems. There were numerous changes in top management. In the spring, Habets had to postpone both the presentation of the balance sheet and the general meeting because regulatory issues had to be clarified at the voucher subsidiary Jochen Schweizer Mydays. At the meeting at the end of June, the group faced massive criticism. “Pro Sieben Sat 1 gives the impression of a poorly produced reality show,” said a shareholder representative.
New strategy to initiate trend reversal
The difficulties can also be seen in the balance sheet: In the first quarter, sales fell by a good 13 percent to 816 million euros compared to the previous year. Operating profit collapsed by 52 percent to 53 million euros. The stock had recently recovered, but is still down two percent year-on-year.
CEO Habets wants to initiate a turnaround with a new strategy. The manager wants to focus more on entertainment. The group’s own streaming platform Joyn will play a central role in this. The group took over this completely in autumn 2022. Joyn is far behind the global providers Netflix or Disney+, but also compared to that German Offer RTL+ back.
>> Read here: The new Pro-Sieben boss wants to convert the Joyn streaming service into a “super platform”.
Habets wants Joyn’s monthly user count double in the next 18 to 24 months from the current four million. He also plans to license offers from the public broadcasters ARD and ZDF to Joyn.
Pro Sieben Sat 1 is not the only media company to cut jobs. At the beginning of the year, the RTL Group announced that it would cut 1,000 jobs at its Cologne headquarters and at Gruner + Jahr’s Hamburg magazine business. The Springer Group is also remodeling its flagship “Bild”. There, up to 30 percent of the jobs are to be cut in some parts of the workforce.
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