The people familiar with the matter investigated billionaire biotechnology investor Patrick Soon-Shiong after selling the Los Angeles Times less than three years after buying it for $ 500 million.
The move is a sudden sight for Mr. Soon-Shiong, who pledged to restore the stability of the West Coast news agency and invested hundreds of millions of dollars in the newspaper in an effort to reverse it.
When Mr. Soon-Shiong in 2018 the Times, the San Diego Union-Tribune and a handful of weekly magazines from Tribune Publishing Co. turmoil and diminution at the publications. At the time, he said the sale represented the beginning of a new era and that he intended to do what was necessary to make the business viable for the next 100 years.
The people have since become dissatisfied with the slow expansion of the digital audience and the significant losses of the news organization. He also increasingly believed that the Los Angeles Times and San Diego Union-Tribune – collectively known as the California Times Company – would be better served if they were part of a larger media group, they said.
Mr. Soon-Shiong was strongly focused on the efforts of his immunotherapy company to develop a Covid-19 vaccine and had little time to devote to the Times, people familiar with the matter said. “Covid really brought him back to the lab,” one of the men said.