Trinity Mirror buys regional news reival Local World for £220million

Newspaper publisher Trinity Mirror has agreed to buy rival Local World for £220 million, making it the UK’s largest regional news outlet.

The deal will see Trinity buy the 80% of shares it does not already own in Local World for £154.4million, and will allow it to make cost savings of £10m to £12m from its second year of ownership.

Trinity also owns the Daily Mirror and Sunday Mirror, the Daily Record and the People as well as local titles such as the Western Mail and the Liverpool Echo.

It added that it will raise around £35.4m in a share sale as part of the financing for the deal, which will give it control of more than 200 titles.

Local World owns 83 print publications including 16 daily titles and 36 paid-for weeklies.

It said most of its titles cover the South West and Wales, London and the South East, and the Midlands and the North.

Trinity Mirror chief executive Simon Fox said: “This is a good day for local media. Local World is a business we know and respect and, by combining it with Trinity Mirror, we will create an organisation of scale, with the talent and financial capacity to invest and adapt to the rapidly changing media landscape.

“It is a vote of confidence in local press and its future.”