Ringier and Axel Springer sign contract to create jointly owned company in Switzerland. The new joint-venture company will accommodate all Ringier publications in German-speaking and French-speaking Switzerland, along with their online offerings and Le Temps, the quality daily newspaper published in French-speaking Switzerland, as well as Axel Springer Switzerland, the firm operating all the Swiss businesses of Axel Springer SE. The new company s name will be Ringier Axel Springer Media Schweiz AG and its registered offices will be in Zurich. The new company's joint owners intend for it to achieve a significant enhancement of their competitive capabilities in the Swiss newspaper and magazine readership market and in the Swiss advertising arena. Further digitalization of their well-known publishing brands is also a key objective. By joining forces in this way, Ringier and Axel Springer are extending the scope of their existing, and highly successful, partnership in Eastern Europe to encompass the Swiss market as well. Since it was first established in July 2010, Ringier Axel Springer Media AG, the joint-venture company which runs the two firms businesses in Eastern Europe, has managed to more than quintuple the proportion of overall revenues generated from digital activities, increasing them from a mere 7% five years ago to their current level of 36%. Ringier will fully consolidate its stake in the planned new company. Axel Springer will consolidate its earnings from the new company on a pro-rata basis. Ringier Axel Springer Media Switzerland AG plans to commence its operations on January 1, 2016, and will initially be based in its various existing premises in Zurich. The new company also intends to runs its businesses from shared premises by 2017.

Marc Walder, the CEO Ringier of AG, will be Chairman of the new company's Board of Directors. Ralph Büchi, President International of Axel Springer SE, will take up the duties of Board Delegate, and the executive management team of the new joint-venture company will report directly to him. Claudio Cisullo, a member of Ringier AG's Board of Directors, and Alexander Theobald, Head of Operations and Business Development at Ringier AG, will also represent Ringier on the Board of the new company. Axel Springer will in addition be represented on the new company's Board by Dr. Mathias Döpfner, Chairman and CEO of Axel Springer SE, and Dr. Julian Deutz, CFO of Axel Springer SE. The members of the new company s executive management committee will be Urs Heller, Head of Magazine Publishing for German-speaking Switzerland, Marcel Hürlimann, who will serve as both CFO and COO, Daniel Pillard, Head of Publishing for French-speaking Switzerland, Jörg Tobuschat, who will be in charge of user-market activities and will also act as Deputy Head of Magazine Publishing for German-speaking Switzerland, and Roland Wahrenberger, who will manage the Beobachter group of titles and the Amiado Group. Initially, Ralph Büchi will be the acting head of business-media activities.