Positions that become vacant in the Group should not be filled.
(Photo: Reuters)
Unterfoehring 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 weak as a result of high inflation, and companies in Germany in particular 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.
According to Habets, the company is operating in an extremely challenging economic environment for the fourth year in a row. “It is therefore essential that we significantly reduce our material and personnel costs.”
In addition, Pro Sieben Sat 1 is struggling with home-grown problems. 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.
>> Read here: The new Pro-Sieben boss wants to convert the Joyn streaming service into a “super platform”.
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. This is far behind the global providers Netflix or Disney+, but also behind the German offer RTL+. Habets wants to double the monthly number of Joyn users in the next 18 to 24 months from the current four million.
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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