The Competition Bureau has approved the sale of 14 Transcontinental Media community newspapers. Transcontinental Inc. originally proposed to acquire 74 community newspapers from Québecor Media Inc. To preserve competition and identify alternatives to Transcontinental owning all the newspapers, the Commissioner of Competition and Transcontinental signed a Consent Agreement in May 2014. The agreement requires Transcontinental to put 33 newspapers up for sale. Despite offering various incentives, no buyer was found for 19 community newspapers and Transcontinental now retains full ownership of these newspapers.
Out of the 14 approved sales, 3 community newspapers will operate as traditional weekly newspapers and the remaining 11 will operate in online format.
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