Blic
Peter Kelbel and Aleksandar Lupšić founded the daily Blic in 1996. In the 1990s, it was known as the only "opposition" newspaper in Serbia. After the October 5 changes, in November 2000, Kelbel and Lupšić sold the newspaper together with the parent company Blic Press to the German publishing company Gruner + Jahr, already owned by the conglomerate Bertelsman. This company sold Blic to Ringier in 2004 and since then this media has been focused on earnings, which has been reflected in the style, content and editorial policy of the daily newspaper and portal. For years, Blic was recognized as a newspaper that was close to the Democratic Party that was in power between 2000 and 2012. While in the 1990s it was one of the few newspapers that expressed a critical opinion towards the government, it began to do so less and less. He has maintained this editorial policy to this day with small ups and downs. The focus on increasing profits led to several rounds of layoffs, which created great dissatisfaction among employees. In the period between 2010 and 2022, the ultimate owner of Blic was the international group Ringier Axel Springer Media AG, which was founded by the merger of Ringier AG from Switzerland and Axel Springer SE from Germany. Since 2022, after the withdrawal of the Germans, Blic has been owned by the Swiss media group Riniger, which operates in Central and Eastern Europe and Africa. According to the latest report of the Press Council, the daily Blic still has a significant number of articles that violate the Journalistic Code. This newspaper often places unmarked advertising, often violates the presumption of innocence in reporting and reports on the most serious crimes in detail. In a report on compliance with the Journalists' Code in the daily newspaper for the period from October 1, 2022 to January 31, 2023, the Press Council stated that 174 articles published in Blic violated the code. According to the data of BIRN's database "Openly about open calls", in 2020, the company Ringier Serbia received half a million dinars for one project from the city of Novi Sad in a public competition.
Audience Share
10.69%
Ownership Type
Private
Geographic Coverage
National
Content Type
Paid content: 70 RSD per copy (2023)
Media Companies / Groups
Ringier Serbia
Ownership Structure
Blic is owned by Ringier Serbia, which has been 100% owned by Ringier Central and Eastern Europe AG, a Swiss media group operating in Central and Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa, since 2022. The majority owners of this company are brother and sister, Michael Ringier and Evelyn Lingg-Ringier. They sold 25% of the stake to the insurance company Die Mobiliar in 2020. Mark Walder, the company's director, also holds a smaller stake.
Individual Owner
Group / Individual Owner
Die Mobiliar
Founded in 1826, Die Mobiliar is one of the leading Swiss insurance companies that provides operating, building, liability, vehicle, life and term, accident and health, transportation and travel insurance, as well as, comprehensive insurance and pension products, services, and consulting services. According to its 2022 annual report, it had 6226 employees.
Mark Walder
Marc Walder was a professional tennis player and actively competed in ATP tournaments between 1984 and 1991. Following shoulder injury, he entered journalism in 1992, writing for the sports section of Swiss daily newspaper Blick, published by Ringier. Few years later, he became the editor-in-chief of Ringier’s weekly magazine Schweizer Illustrierte. After he graduated from the Advanced Executive Management Program at Harvard Business School in Boston in 2008, Walder started rising through Ringier's ranks and was appointed Chairman of the Group Executive Board of Ringier AG in April 2012. In 2018, he became managing partner at Ringier as he acquired a 10% stake at the company.
He also serves as a board member of numerous tech companies, such as sportradar, sports technology company and SMG Swiss Marketplace Group. Waldwer was awarded the honorary "Digital Economy Ambassador" prize for his commitment to the Swiss economy and the ICT sector in 2019.
General Information
Founding Year
1996
Affiliated Interests Founder
Prior to entering the media sector, Austrian Peter Kelbel was a spokesman in the government of Austrian Prime Minister Bruno Krajski. Together with Lupšić, he founded the daily Blic in 1996, and three years later the portal was launched. Before arriving in Serbia, they two were trying to establish newspapers in Prague and Bratislava. Lupsic and Klebel left Blic in 2001 when the company was taken over by the German company Bertelsmann, and later by the international company Ringier AG. After the founding of Blic, Klebel and Lupšić entered television production. Lupsic was the majority owner of Kosava TV, where he worked with Kelbel. Kelbel then took over two television stations in Germany: Berlin and Munich. Later, he added TV U1TV (today Schweiz 5) from Switzerland to the TV empire, and in 2008 he founded a television in the Principality of Liechtenstein, where he was the head of the program until his death. Peter Kelbel died in 2018 in Vienna at the age of 67.
Affiliated Interests Ceo
Has been with the company since 2004, when she started working as a brand manager of the daily Blic. In the period from 2005 to 2008, as director of marketing and development and director of daily editions, she participated in the expansion of the company's portfolio. Drakulić Petrović became the CEO of Ringier Serbia in July 2008, and she is still in that position today.
The name Drakulić Petrović is regularly included in the lists of the most powerful women in Serbia and is indispensable on the traditional list of "100 most powerful women in Serbia" published by the Blic daily around the New Year. In the last few years, she has been ranked 15th on that list.
When Ringier opened, as they stated, the most modern printing house in the Balkans in 2013, the guest of honor at the opening was then First Deputy Prime Minister of Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic, who opened the printing house in the company of Drakulić Petrović. After that, in 2014, after the May floods in Obrenovac, Vucic and Drakulić Petrović shared aid together with the affected citizens. Aleksandar Vucic, the president of Serbia, is a regular guest at Blic's birthday parties.
In August 2023, Drakulić Petrović became the owner of the weekly NIN, which had previously been in the portfolio of the Ringier company. She now owns 99 percent of the stake in this weekly, while the rest belongs to the founders and honorary owners.
Affiliated Interests Editor-In-Chief
Has been the editor-in-chief of the Blic daily since 2016. Mihailović started his career in Blic as a journalist, and from 2005 he was editor of Entertainment, Culture, Politics, and Blic of the Week, before becoming deputy editor-in-chief of Blic, and then editor-in-chief.
Contact
Kosovska 10
Stari grad, Belgrade
E-mail: redakcija@blic.rs, redakcija_blic@ringier.rs
W: www.blic.rs
T: +381 11 333 4 555
Financial Information
Revenue (in Mill. $)
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Operating Profit (in Mill. $)
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Advertising (in % of total funding)
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Market Share
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Further Information
Headlines
Meta Data
Missing data on printed and sold circulation, market share and advertising revenue. Financial data is available only for the company that publishes the media, but not for the media itself.
