Time Inc to leave namesake building after spinoff

Time Inc. will move out of its namesake Manhattan office building when it is spun off from media giant Time Warner next month. The spinoff of the magazine publishing unit is set for June 6, and the company will get a new home, leaving the midtown Time & Life building where it has been since 1959. "This is a very important move for Time Inc. as we become an independent company,” said Joe Ripp, chairman and chief executive of Time, who on Thursday announced the move to offices on Liberty Street in lower Manhattan. Ripp said the company got incentives from the city and state as it evaluated options in the region, including in New Jersey. "Lower Manhattan has become a new destination for creative businesses," Ripp said. "We have ambitious plans for a modern, open workspace that will be designed to foster a greater sense of community and collaboration across the company, and it will deliver significant cost savings." Time Warner announced plans last year for a spinoff, which came on the heels of moves by Rupert Murdoch's NewsCorp separating its publishing and entertainment divisions. The titles of the publishing unit include Time magazine, People, Fortune and Sports Illustrated. It has several international magazines including global editions of Time and Fortune and publishing operations in Britain and Mexico. The publishing industry is grappling with a steep drop in print advertising revenue, steadily declining circulation and the migration of readers to free news online. A regulatory filing said the spinoff will be effective June 6, for shareholders of record as of May 23. The document said the new firm will have "one of the strongest collections of media brands," reaching some 100 million US consumers in print and 70 million online each month. It has 23 US magazines and licenses more than 50 editions for print or digital distribution in some 30 countries. When its finances are calculated independently of Time Warner, the unit showed a net profit of $201 million on revenues of $3.35 billion in 2013.