Marc Benioff and His Wife Lynne to Buy TIME Magazine

The chief of Salesforce, Marc Benioff and his wife Lynne are buying the world’s most popular Magazine TIME for $190 million from Media and Marketing Company, Meredith Corporation and within a month the deal will be completed. Salesforce is a pioneer in the field of cloud computing.

In a statement released by Meredith Corporation, which also declares the sale says, “the Benioff are purchasing TIME personally and the transaction is unrelated to Salesforce.com, where Mr. Benioff is Chairman, co-CEO and founder. They will not be involved in operations or journalistic decisions, which will continue to be led by TIME's current executive leadership team”.

President and CEO of Meredith, Tom Harty said in his personal statement said, “we’re pleased to have found such passionate buyers in Marc and Lynne Benioff for the Time brand. For over 90 years, TIME has been at the forefront of the most significant events and impactful stories that shape our global conversation.”

The Editor in Chief of Time Magazine, Edward Felsenthal has also welcomed the move, he said, “On behalf of the entire TIME team, we are very excited to begin this next chapter in our history. We can't imagine better stewards for TIME than Marc and Lynne Benioff.”

Meanwhile, the present owner Marc Benioff also declared on Twitter, “The power of Time has always been in its unique storytelling of the people & issues that affect us all & connect us all. A treasure trove of our history & culture. We have deep respect for their organization & honored to be stewards of this iconic brand”.

In the month of March, Meredith has announced its plan of selling its publications and declared that it is looking for a buyer for four magazines, which includes TIME, Fortune and Sports Illustrated.

With the deal towards finalization, Marc Benioff has also joined the elite group of billionaires who have purchased renowned publications in the past few months and years. The group also includes Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, one of the world’s wealthiest person, who bought the renowned newspaper Washington Post in the year 2013. The same year, billionaire Patrick Soon Shiong, bought The Los Angeles Times in the month of June. Billionaire investor Warren Buffet also has bought a series of newspapers in the recent years.

Though US President Donald Trump has personal enmity with some of these newspapers, like for example, the Washington Post is the frequent target of his angry Twitter outbursts.

Marc Benioff though has made it clear that he is neither a Democrat nor a Republican, but during the 2016 Presidential election, he publicly supported Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump, as the President of the country.

Meredith, the publisher of magazines such as People and Better Homes & Gardens, had put up four TIME Inc. publications for sale in the month of March. Negotiations for the sale of the three other publications, Fortune, Money and Sports Illustrated are still underway.

TIME, like any other magazines, has struggled with the continued declines in print advertising and newsstand sales. Started by two Yale University graduates Henry Luce and Briton Hadden, TIME Magazine first went for sale in the month of March, 1923.