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SPH retrenching 140 employees due to Covid-19

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SPH retrenching 140 employees due to Covid-19

source: https://mothership.sg/2020/08/sph-retrench-140-employees/

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Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) held a restructuring exercise on Tuesday, Aug. 18, laying off 140 employees from the Media Solutions Division (MSD) and SPH Magazines.

According to SPH, this accounts for about 5 per cent of the group's overall headcount, and will incur retrenchment costs of approximately S$8 million.

Covid-19 has significantly impacted advertising revenue

SPH's CEO Ng Yat Chung said that subscription and readership of SPH's news titles have "increased since the onset of Covid-19", but the Covid-19 pandemic has also significantly impacted their advertising revenue.

"A more integrated approach of producing and selling our content across our various platforms will allow us to deal more efficiently and effectively with the new level of demand we are seeing from our advertisers and audience," said Ng.

According to SPH's statement, the group has informed the Ministry of Manpower (MOM), the Creative Media and Publishing Union (CMPU) and National Trades Union Congress on this exercise.

Affected staff will receive compensation on terms negotiated and agreed with the union.

"CMPU and SPH management jointly reviewed the selection criteria to ensure that the Singaporean Core within the company is safeguarded as far as possible. The union also negotiated for a fair compensation package for affected employees", said CMPU in a media statement.

SPH also said that it have been working closely with the union and the Employment and Employability Institute (e2i) to ensure that affected staff will receive the help and support they require during this period.

SPH's last retrenchment exercise was in October 2019

This is SPH's third round of retrenchment since 2017.

In October 2019, SPH announced that it will retrench 5 per cent of its staff by the end of the year, despite earning a profit of S$213.2 million for the financial year which ended in Aug. 31, 2019.

In October 2017, the media group cut 230 jobs, 130 of which were retrenchments.

The remaining job reductions resulted from retirement, termination of contracts and roles that were eliminated due to restructuring of work processes.

This resulted in a total of 15 per cent of the staff in newsrooms and sales operations being reduced.

According to SPH, the company has reviewed its costs, cut back on discretionary spending, and instituted pay cuts for senior management since the start of the Covid-19 crisis.

In March this year, SPH announced that its directors, which includes the CEO, and senior management would be taking voluntary pay cuts of 10 per cent and 5 per cent respectively.

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😥 This is a sad sad news for the media industry and also to my affected long-distance colleauges.

 

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13177

13177

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(edited)

This is SPH third round of retrenchment, business really super bad in SPH siah! But dont know how many reporters in SPH got affected by all the retrenchment taken place? So the media group refer to the radio division in SPH?

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Mkl22

Mkl22

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(edited)
29 minutes ago, Vinceng said:

SPH is in good hands under the proven leadership of CEO Ng Yat Chung. Painful decision but a necessary evil.

this guy is the best. a real sinke sinker.... hahahahahahah

Quote from his wiki page. "On 19 May 2017, Reuters reported that CMA managed to turn Neptune Orient Lines around, with NOL posting a $26 million net profit for Q1 2017.[13] Ng has been criticised by numerous publications for not being able to do so, despite five years as CEO"

CMA bought NOL in June2016.... May 2017 can turn a profit liao..

 

Edited by Mkl22
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inlinesix

inlinesix

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Since staff from Media Solutions Division (MSD) and SPH Magazines is affected, it clearly lost of income from advertisement and magazine sales.

Not surprising kenna chop

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Lethalstrike

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32 minutes ago, Mkl22 said:

this guy is the best. a real sinke sinker.... hahahahahahah

Quote from his wiki page. "On 19 May 2017, Reuters reported that CMA managed to turn Neptune Orient Lines around, with NOL posting a $26 million net profit for Q1 2017.[13] Ng has been criticised by numerous publications for not being able to do so, despite five years as CEO"

CMA bought NOL in June2016.... May 2017 can turn a profit liao..

 

SPH delisted from STI, with Ng at the helm. 

https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/sph-be-removed-straits-times-index-replaced-mapletree-industrial-trust

Track record in actual performance is not the deciding factor on who becomes CEO of SPH. Nuff said...

ngyatchung_spf_chairman_replace_alanchan

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t0y0ta

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General Ng has brilliant record of destroying shareholder value and usually only has 1 tactic - cut staff. 

It is rather appropriate to use him on the state Media - I guess with social media even PAP has seen that SPH no much more "messaging" value.

Just hope he does not get rotated to SMRT or SBS, the moment he does... confirm COE chiong because soon no more viable public transport

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Carbon82

Carbon82

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Poor COVID-19, kena blamed again for someone's incompetency... [shakehead]

Advertising dollars are linked to a few parameters, including content and readership. With every other page labelled as premium article, I have been surfing ST online much much lesser than CNA and a few other overseas news sites. For newspaper, the content are not worth my >$1 per day.

It is their business strategy that kills SPH, with or without COVID-19. 

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Windwaver

Windwaver

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1 hour ago, Mkl22 said:

this guy is the best. a real sinke sinker.... hahahahahahah

Quote from his wiki page. "On 19 May 2017, Reuters reported that CMA managed to turn Neptune Orient Lines around, with NOL posting a $26 million net profit for Q1 2017.[13] Ng has been criticised by numerous publications for not being able to do so, despite five years as CEO"

CMA bought NOL in June2016.... May 2017 can turn a profit liao..

 

The funny thing is people continue to be drawing high salary as CEO

Y1By.gif

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Throttle2

Throttle2

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4 minutes ago, Windwaver said:

The funny thing is people continue to be drawing high salary as CEO

Y1By.gif

And the joke is on us !  KNN..... BASKET

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ToyotaShuttle

ToyotaShuttle

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36 minutes ago, Lethalstrike said:

SPH delisted from STI, with Ng at the helm. 

https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/sph-be-removed-straits-times-index-replaced-mapletree-industrial-trust

Track record in actual performance is not the deciding factor on who becomes CEO of SPH. Nuff said...

 

Did he get a good price for the sale? If so, he has done his job. 

 

1 hour ago, Mkl22 said:

this guy is the best. a real sinke sinker.... hahahahahahah

Quote from his wiki page. "On 19 May 2017, Reuters reported that CMA managed to turn Neptune Orient Lines around, with NOL posting a $26 million net profit for Q1 2017.[13] Ng has been criticised by numerous publications for not being able to do so, despite five years as CEO"

CMA bought NOL in June2016.... May 2017 can turn a profit liao..

 

CMA CGM has economies of scale lah.

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inlinesix

inlinesix

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1 hour ago, Carbon82 said:

Poor COVID-19, kena blamed again for someone's incompetency... [shakehead]

Advertising dollars are linked to a few parameters, including content and readership. With every other page labelled as premium article, I have been surfing ST online much much lesser than CNA and a few other overseas news sites. For newspaper, the content are not worth my >$1 per day.

It is their business strategy that kills SPH, with or without COVID-19. 

SCMP also moves toward subscriber format.

As compared to ZB, ZB has better content vetting as compared to ST. 

In addition, ZB has more free hand in the way the news was presented.  This is clearly evidence during GE

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Mkl22

Mkl22

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32 minutes ago, t0y0ta said:

General Ng has brilliant record of destroying shareholder value and usually only has 1 tactic - cut staff. 

It is rather appropriate to use him on the state Media - I guess with social media even PAP has seen that SPH no much more "messaging" value.

Just hope he does not get rotated to SMRT or SBS, the moment he does... confirm COE chiong because soon no more viable public transport

Maybe parachute to a single seat MP seat. So he can lose it for PAP! Hahhahaaha

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Mkl22

Mkl22

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14 minutes ago, RH1667 said:

Will SPH be sold ? 

Will we be reading Snake Times or Sin Hua Times soon? 😄

Will be like SIA la. National asset. Continue to pump money even if it starts to sink. 

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