John Fry, the Archant chief executive who sold Johnston Press a portfolio of Scottish weekly papers last year, is to follow them by taking on the top job at the Edinburgh publisher.
John Fry, the Archant chief executive who sold Johnston Press a portfolio of Scottish weekly papers last year, is to follow them by taking on the top job at the Edinburgh publisher.
He is to succeed Tim Bowdler as chief executive of the group, whose titles include The Scotsman and Yorkshire Post, following four years running privately-owned Archant, best known for its regional titles Eastern Daily Press and East Anglian Daily Times.
The confirmation of the move boosted Johnston Press shares which rose 5.6% to close at 37.5p.
Fry oversaw the sale of eight papers to Johnston Press, including paid-for weekly titles Ellon Times & East Gordon Advertiser, the Buchan Observer and the Fraserburgh Herald in an £11.2m deal in January 2007, before the advertising market plummeted.
He will join Johnston Press on January 5, as the company recovers from a difficult year in which it launched a rights issue and obtained a £212m cash injection from Malaysian billionaire Ananda Krishnan to prevent it from breaking banking covenants.
Before he moved into newspaper publishing, Fry was for nine years president of the information firm Dun & Bradstreet for UK, Europe, the Middle East and Africa, after four years at management consultant Bain & Company.
He started his career with Procter & Gamble.
