108-532: Axel Cäsar Springer (2 May 1912 – 22 September 1985) was a German publisher and founder of what is now Axel Springer SE , the largest media publishing firm in Europe. By the early 1960s his print titles dominated the West German daily press market. His Bild Zeitung became the nation's tabloid. In the late 1960s, Springer entered into confrontation with the emergent New Left . Hostile coverage of student protests and
216-462: A leitmotif of his company's journalism. Axel Caesar Springer was born 2 May 1912 in Altona , a borough of Hamburg , the son Ottilie (née Müller) and Hinrich Springer . The senior Springer owned a small printing and publishing firm, Hammerich & Lesser-Verla, and was the treasurer of the centrist or centre-left German Democratic Party (Deutsche Demokratische Partei). After being apprenticed as
324-440: A $ 635.7 million offer by Axel for leading French real estate website operator seloger.com caused seloger shares to rise as much as 32%, the most since it went public. Within 3 days Axel increased its offer 15.6% to $ 735 million after shareholders rejected the deal. In 2012, Axel Springer formed a joint venture (Axel Springer Digital Classified) with global growth equity firm General Atlantic . The company also bought TotalJobs in
432-587: A 51% majority stake in the American television production company GRB Entertainment , but was later divested in 2002. In 2001, Axel Springer and T-Online established a joint subsidiary Bild.de/T-Online AG. A year later in 2002, the launch of immonet.de took place, and Mathias Doepfner, former editor-in-chief of Die Welt , became CEO of Axel Springer AG. Then in 2003, the name was changed to Axel Springer AG. In 2009, Axel Springer AG acquired affiliate marketers Zanox and Digital Window as well as StepStone ASA. In 2010
540-497: A TV magazine as well. In 1948, the afternoon and evening newspaper Hamburger Abendblatt was launched, the first daily newspaper created by Axel Springer. The year 1952 saw the launch of the popular daily newspaper Bild . The paper was based on the British tabloid Daily Mirror and peaked at a circulation of 5 million in the 1980s. The Sunday paper Bild am Sonntag was launched in 1956. In 1953, Axel Springer Verlag bought
648-552: A U.S. Senate hearing that Minister of Defence Strauss and his party had received at least $ 10 million in remuneration for arranging West Germany's purchase of 900 F-104G Starfighters in 1961, which later became part of the Lockheed bribery scandals . The party, its leaders, and Strauss all denied the allegations; and Strauss filed a slander suit against Hauser. Strauss and Hauser had met after World War II in Schongau, Bavaria , where Hauser
756-718: A butcher, Strauss studied German letters , history and economics at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich from 1935 to 1939. In World War II , he served in the Wehrmacht on the Western and Eastern Fronts. While on furlough , he passed the German state exams to become a teacher. After suffering from severe frostbite on the Eastern Front in early 1943, he served as an Offizier für wehrgeistige Führung , responsible for
864-625: A car accident in 1984. They had three children: Maximilan Josef [ de ] , Franz Georg [ de ] , and Monika , who was member of the Landtag of Bavaria and a Bavarian minister. In 2009 she was elected to the European Parliament . Strauss shaped post-war Bavaria and polarized the public like few others. He was an articulate leader of conservatives and a skilled rhetorician. His outspoken right-leaning political standpoints made him an opponent of more moderate politicians and
972-528: A compositor he worked on his father’s paper, Altonaer Nachrichten. Following Hitler's assumption of untrammeled power in 1933, new press ordinances made Springer directly accountable to the Ministry of Propaganda , although as editor of the sports and business pages he may have remained relatively free of Nazi-party dictation. After paper shortages shut the daily in 1941, he stayed with the firm printing literary works until Allied air raids in 1944 destroyed both
1080-516: A continuing rightward drift in editorial comment were met with boycotts and printing-press blockades, and later in 1972 with the bombing of the company offices by the Red Army Faction (the "Baader Meinhof Gang"). In the late 1970s, exposés of journalistic malpractice by the investigative reporter Günter Wallraff led to Press Council reprimands. Sometimes referred to as Germany's Rupert Murdoch , Springer, with counter suits and minor divestments,
1188-515: A demonstrator and a policeman were killed after students ransacked the Bild editorial offices. There were over a thousand arrests. "A tendentious headline in Bild ", the protesters claimed, "is more violence than a stone against the head of a policeman". Helmut Schmidt , then parliamentary leader of the Social Democrats, sought to intervene with Springer. Schmidt conceded that the publisher's success
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#17328482040801296-506: A donation of 3.6 million Deutsche Mark ($ 900,000) to The Israel Museum, Jerusalem , which would name an auditorium in his honor. Protesters took to the streets, and the Israeli newspaper LaMerhav declared that for the museum to accept money from a German would be a "disavowal of Jewish memory". (It was ultimately decided that Springer's generosity should be honored by a plaque). Springer returned to Jerusalem on 10 June 1967, to celebrate, in
1404-470: A fully privately owned and operated media company. In September 2015, Axel Springer acquired Business Insider at a $ 442 million valuation. It purchased an additional 88% of the company for $ 343 million, bringing its total ownership to 97%. In October 2020, Axel Springer and Insider Inc. acquired Morning Brew, a media startup that focuses on business newsletters and podcasts, for around $ 75 million. The Morning Brew brand remains fully intact post-deal, and
1512-547: A groundbreaking economic stability policy; the two ministers, quite unlike in physical appearance and political background, were popularly dubbed Plisch und Plum [ de ] , after two dogs in a 19th-century cartoon by Wilhelm Busch . After the SPD was able to form a government without the conservatives, in 1969 , Strauss became one of the most vocal critics of Willy Brandt 's Ostpolitik . After Helmut Kohl 's first run for chancellor in 1976 failed, Strauss cancelled
1620-623: A loan of 3 billion Deutsche Marks given to East Germany . This move, in violation of longtime CSU/CDU policy to allow the East German economy to collapse naturally, was widely criticised even during Strauss's lifetime. The Republicans split from the CSU/CDU over this move. Strauss was a strong Bavarian monarchist. Strauß campaigned vehemently for the construction of the Wackersdorf nuclear reprocessing plant (WAA) in Wackersdorf (Bavaria), which
1728-438: A news report which doxed and discredited several pro-Palestinian student protesters. Major competitors in the German publishing market include Bauer Media Group , Bertelsmann , Hubert Burda Media , and Holtzbrinck . On a global scale, some of the key competitors of Axel Springer include other large multinational media companies such as News Corporation, Time Warner, and The New York Times Company. These companies operate in
1836-534: A pledge. He also insists that journalistic integrity remains paramount, clarifying that the company's stance does not equate to uncritical support of Israel, but recognizes its right to exist in light of historical threats. In 2017, Mark Dekan of Ringier Axel Springer Polska expressed support for European unity and the role of free media in a letter to employees, amidst political debates in Poland. His comments, which included criticism of Jarosław Kaczyński , and highlighted
1944-455: A position, not itself welcome on the conservative right, that Germans had themselves to blame for their country's division: "What Germany did under Hitler was terrible, and we were destined to suffer for it". But noting that "the people in the other part of Germany were no more guilty than those of us over here", he insisted that they deserved "same kind of chance" at rehabilitation that democratic and market freedoms had allowed their compatriots in
2052-541: A pro-American stance, often omitting criticism of US foreign policy. This observation is then backed by allegations made by two former CIA officers in an interview with The Nation , claiming that Axel Springer received $ 7 million from the CIA. The purpose of this funding, they allege, was to influence the publisher to align its editorial content with American geopolitical interests. Although no conclusive evidence has come to light, Springer's admission in his autobiography regarding
2160-464: A relative upstart bank credit would have been difficult to come by; and his first stock for public subscription was not issued until months before his death in 1985. There were rumours that Springer, in the early post war years, was the beneficiary of covert U.S. efforts to shape and direct public opinion in Germany. According to the American investigative journalist Murray Waas "highly reliable sources in
2268-527: A relatively "apolitical" motorist club, the NSKK was a paramilitary organisation, implicated in the regime's racist policy of exclusion and discrimination (it screened its members for Aryan traits) and in the anti-semitic pogroms of 1938 . After the war, in 1946, Springer founded his own publishing company, Axel Springer GmbH , in Hamburg publishing the radio (and later TV) listings magazine Hörzu . Never having worn
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#17328482040802376-460: A reporter: "I know very well that there are people who consider me naïve. But I believe in reunification within five years." In addition to permanent German neutrality, Springer was proposing a nuclear-free Central Europe. Nikita Khrushchev kept Springer and Zehrer waiting sixteen days for an interview. It did not go well, and cannot have been helped by Springer seeking to convince the Soviet premier of
2484-457: A shot at the chancellery may have been seen as an endorsement of either Strauss' policies or style (or both) over Kohl's. But many, if not most, observers at the time believed that the CDU had concluded that Helmut Schmidt's SPD was likely unbeatable in 1980, and felt that they had nothing to lose in running Strauss. Schmidt's victory was seen by Kohl's supporters as a vindication of their man, and though
2592-566: A stand against SA methods". Protesters broke windows at Springer offices and tried to disrupt printing and delivery, but the trade unions kept their distance from the anti-Springer campaign, and the SDS, increasingly focussed on the War in Vietnam , conceded that the protests had failed to "mobilise the masses". After a month it called a halt. When on 11 April 1968, the SDS leader Rudi Dutschke (who had called for
2700-520: A uniform (thanks to asthma and diabetes) or been a member of the Nazi party (from which, by virtue of his marriage to Martha Meyer, he would have been excluded), Springer was able to obtain from the British occupation authorities a license to run a newspaper. His first daily was the Hamburger Abendblatt . Competing in Hamburg with the five other dailies, Springer offered a paper he described as "geared to
2808-574: A united Europe, "reconciliation between Germans and Jews" and Israel's right to exist and a free-market economy, and that staff who disagree with the principles "should not work for Axel Springer, very clearly". In an interview with New York Magazine, Döpfner emphasized that Axel Springer's commitment to these core principles, particularly the right of Israel to exist, stems from Germany's historical context rather than activism. He claimed that while Springer employees in Germany are required to support these values, American employees are not asked to sign such
2916-416: A variety of different media sectors, including print, television, and digital, and are all major players in the global media industry. In addition to traditional media companies, Axel Springer also competes with a number of digital media platforms and companies, such as Google, Facebook, and Apple, which have become increasingly influential in the media industry in recent years. These companies have disrupted
3024-584: Is a commitment of their founder that Axel Springer SE sustains. It remains enshrined in the company's mission statement. Springer received honorary degrees from Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan (1974), and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (1976). In 1977 he received the American Friendship Medal. In 1978, he was awarded the inaugural Leo Baeck Medal . In 1985, he received the gold medal of
3132-406: Is framed and driven by a demagogic and unscrupulous tabloid press. "No one", Haffner argued in liberal weekly Stern , "has planted the seeds of violence more keenly than Springer journalism". Springer declared that no government minister need tell him "what the people think". Critics, however, focussed less on his supposedly canny sense for the public, than on his press capacity to shape opinion. It
3240-767: Is his fifth (and last) wife Friede Springer (born 1942) who, 30 years Springer's junior, had been his son's nanny. In 1971, Springer published a collection of his speeches and essays: Von Berlin aus gesehen. Zeugnisse eines engagierten Deutschen (Seewald Verlag, Hamburg). Axel Springer SE Axel Springer SE ( German pronunciation: [ˈaksl̩ ˈʃpʁɪŋɐ ɛsˈeː] ) is a German multinational mass and online media company, based in Berlin, Germany. The company offers printing and publishing of advertisements, digital classifieds portfolio, marketing models and related services. Axel Springer's operations are segmented into News Media, Classifieds Media, and Marketing Media. The company
3348-513: Is organized as a societas Europaea (SE) publishing house and is one of the largest mass media publishers in the European Union , with numerous multimedia news brands , such as Bild , Die Welt , Fakt , and the US political news site Politico , which Axel Springer acquired in 2021. The company generated total revenues of about €3.93 billion and an EBITDA increase of 12.8% in
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3456-604: Is possible that CIA funding is confused with support from the Government and Relief in Occupied Areas (GARIOA) programme (wound up in October 1950) which Die Zeit , among other pro-democratic, pro-Allied publishing efforts, are known to have benefitted. Springer always maintained that his financial springboard was Hörzu which, attuned to the new radio and television age, was ground breaking and had no market rival. On 26 October 1962,
3564-727: Is the largest classifieds site in Israel. The website publishes real estate listings across Israel, including rental apartments and sales in Israeli settlements that are considered illegal under international law. While private users can use the website for free, business users have to pay and many a times these real estate brokers and agents are selling or renting properties in illegal settlements. German public broadcasting criticized Axel Springer in 2024 for taking their pro-Israel mission too far and that they therefore believe Palestinians and anyone who expresses criticism of Israel “must be discredited and then written against”, especially criticizing it for
3672-452: The Hamburg offices of Der Spiegel were raided and closed by police. The publisher, Rudolf Augstein , along with the weekly's two editors-in-chief and a reporter were arrested. Defence minister Franz Josef Strauss levelled accusations of treason ( Landesverrat ) in respect to an article detailing NATO projections of "unimaginable chaos" in the event of a Soviet nuclear strike and criticising
3780-786: The North Atlantic alliance. On his return he forbad any criticism of the western allies, whether it was of the British in Cyprus , the French in Algeria , or the Americans in the Taiwan Strait , because "we need them in Berlin". There are questions as to how, in the lean post-war years, Springer was able to finance so large and rapid an expansion. He operated without partners; even after currency reform in 1948, for
3888-656: The Oder-Neisse Line as Germany's final frontier in the east and, on that basis, established diplomatic relations between the Federal Republic and the People's Republic of Poland. Writing himself in Die Welt , Springer expressed outrage that a democratically elected German government should license a Communist regime in its annexation of a quarter of the country. In Bild, Boenisch remarked that, while Brandt attempted "kneel away"
3996-685: The Sozialistischer Deutscher Studentenbund (SDS), the German Socialist Student Union, onto the streets. Swift to denounce those who questioned the equity and social costs of the West German Wirtschaftswunder ("economic miracle"), Springer characterised the "extra-parliamentary opposition" as subversive. In June 1967 an open letter from a large group of writers (among them Ingeborg Drewitz , Hans Magnus Enzensberger and Günter Grass ), accused
4104-611: The IPO of Axel Springer. Later that year, Axel Springer died; control of the company was transferred to his widow Friede Springer . In 1986, the first licensed edition of Auto Bild came out, in Italy. Other licensed editions and joint venture publications later appeared in twenty European countries, Indonesia and Thailand. In 1993, there was the official opening of the offset printing works in Berlin-Spandau. In May 1999, Axel Springer bought
4212-542: The Jerusalem trial of Adolf Eichmann . This was at a time when surveys suggested that only every second West German supported the prosecutions; that a third wished an end to the discussion of the Hitler regime; and that 73% regarded Jews as "a different race". Next to post-war Chancellor Konrad Adenauer , it has been said that "no German played a more significant role in the effort to repair his country's burdened relationship with
4320-601: The Jewish service organisation B'nai B'rith . In 1981, Franz Josef Strauss presented Springer the Konrad Adenauer Freedom Prize in recognition of his contribution to the foundation of a liberal press system, his commitment to the reunification of Germany in peace and freedom, and his exemplary activity in support of reconciliation between German and Jewish people. Springer died in West Berlin in 1985. His heiress
4428-457: The Jews, and to ensure its support for their state, than Axel Springer." It was a cause to which, as early as 1957, he dedicated his newspapers editorially and to which he made his own personal contributions. As had Adenauer in the wake of his 1952 Reparations Agreement , Springer found that in Israel "German money" was not universally welcome. During his first visit to Israel in 1966, Springer proposed
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4536-463: The New York Times in October 2021. These allegations were investigated by Axel Springer, which initially supported Reichelt. However, following further scrutiny, the company ultimately decided to dismiss him. Liz Fekete criticized Axel Springer-owned Welt and Axel Springer CEO Mathias Döpfner in 2024 for their anti-Muslim and anti-Palestinian bias, suggesting falsely that Muslim immigrants are
4644-635: The Politico Europe partnership launched in 2014, as well as the technology news site Protocol, which was launched in 2020. The company previously held shares in aufeminin.com and buy.at . It was also a significant investor in the American digital media company Group Nine Media , before it was acquired by Vox Media. Gudrun Kruip, a scholar associated with the Stiftung Bundespräsident-Theodor-Heuss-Haus , has claimed that Axel Springer SE, along with its subsidiaries, exhibits
4752-564: The Prosecution") of the kinds of journalistic malpractices and unethical research methods Böll had depicted in his novel (directed in 1975 as a film by Volker Schlöndorff and Margarethe von Trotta ). Wallraff (denounced by Springer as a "liar", a "psychopath" and an "underground communist") noted that "Bild regularly broke into the private, even intimate sphere of the people it was reporting about", and he claimed to have seen suicide notes written by people who had their lives publicly scandalised by
4860-578: The Springer Press of "incitement" in a police riot in West Berlin that saw the death of student protester Benno Ohnesorg . Rallied by Ulrike Meinhof 's journal konkret , students had been protesting a visit by the Shah of Iran . Bild's response (3 June 1967) to the death was to declare that where "Students threaten: We shoot back" and "This is where fun and compromise and democratic tolerance end. We have to take
4968-456: The U.S. Air Force refused to purchase the plane due to its unnecessary features. The German contract proved to be a windfall for Lockheed. After Germany ordered the fighter planes from Lockheed, many more European governments started to place their trust in the Starfighter and ordered more planes, saving Lockheed from financial ruin. Strauss was forced to step down as defence minister in 1962 in
5076-619: The U.S. intelligence community" testified to the figure of "some $ 7 million" funnelled through the CIA to Springer in the early 1950s. The case appears otherwise circumstantial, based on Springer's editorial support of U.S. foreign policy . There was no mistaking Springer's anti-communism (he favoured Social Democrat Kurt Schumacher 's description of communists as " rotlackierte Nazis ", red-painted Nazis). But given his dalliance with neutralism, his fixed alignment with American "geopolitical interests" can be dated only from his return from Moscow in 1958. It
5184-580: The UK from Reed Elsevier that year. In 2013, Springer sold its regional newspapers, women's magazines, and television magazines to Funke Mediengruppe for €920 million That same year, Publications Grand Public, a French magazine publisher owned by Springer, was sold to Reworld Media . The German television newsbroadcaster N24 was acquired by Axel Springer SE and combined with Die Welt . In 2020, Friede Springer transferred $ 1.5 billion of Axel Springer shares to CEO Mathias Dopfner, effectively making him heir of
5292-553: The United States, Axel Springer is ranked among the top four digital publishers, alongside USA Today, News Corp, and The New York Times. In 1946, publisher Hinrich Springer (age 66) and his son Axel Springer (age 34) established the limited company Axel Springer Verlag GmbH. That year saw the launch of the Nordwestdeutsche Hefte and the radio and Hörzu , which was originally launched as a radio broadcast but later became
5400-567: The Weimar years , the symbol of a Jewish-German liberal-democratic tradition, but his critics were to note, in line with Die Welt and Bild , a decisive rightward shift in editorial policy. Springer's choice as chief editor for Die Welt was controversial. Hans Zehrer was a veteran of the Kapp Putsch of 1920, and in the last Weimar years had been the editor of the nationalist and anti-republican journal Die Tat . In 1946, he had been removed from
5508-437: The advantages not only of German neutrality but also of West Germany's social market economy . The Russians, like the Americans, viewed their strategic position in Germany as indispensable. Neutrality was not an option. Springer was to describe the trip as the "central political event of my life", convincing him that there was no alternative to Konrad Adenauer 's Westbindung : to discount Communist overtures and to persevere with
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#17328482040805616-612: The alliance between the CDU and CSU parties in the Bundestag, a decision which he only reversed months later when the CDU threatened to extend their party to Bavaria (where the CSU holds a political monopoly for the conservatives). In the 1980 federal election , the CDU/CSU opted to nominate Strauss as their candidate for chancellor. Strauss had continued to be critical of Kohl's leadership, so providing Strauss
5724-641: The attack on the student leader Rudi Dutschke on 11 April 1968, the APO (Extra-Parliamentary Opposition) began acts of violence against the company. The APO had a history of animosity with the Springer Group's allegedly biased coverage of the student movement. For instance, in the wake of the killing of Benno Ohnesorg by the police at a student demonstration against the Shah, one Springer paper reported that "what happened yesterday in Berlin had nothing to do with politics …. It
5832-653: The build-up of the new West German defence forces, the Bundeswehr – the youngest man to hold this office at the time. He became chairman of the CSU in 1961. Strauss stated in a letter to HIAG in March 1957: "I think you know how I personally think about the front line units of the Waffen-SS . They are included in my admiration for the German soldiers of the last world war." Former Lockheed lobbyist Ernest Hauser [ de ] admitted to investigators during
5940-507: The business premises and the family home. Notwithstanding its vilification by the Nazis, Springer was a jazz enthusiast. He played with the possibility of a career in music. His model was the Austrian tenor Richard Tauber , a star of both film and operatic stage who, having a Jewish parent, was also deprecated by the regime. In 1933, Springer married Martha Else Meyer, whose father (like Tauber's)
6048-410: The business will operate completely independently with Insider Inc. The company’s co-founders retain a sizeable minority stake and have an earn-out clause built into the deal. In October 2021, the firm announced that it had completed the acquisition of Politico for over $ 1 billion, after announcing its intention to do so in late August 2021. Along with the deal, Axel Springer took full control of
6156-535: The company of Viennese-born mayor Teddy Kollek , the conquest of the Old City in the Six-Day War . He had ordered his newspapers to cover the war obsessively and with an unapologetically pro-Israel bias, later joking that he had simply published Israeli newspapers in German. "The Israelis", he commented on the front page of Bild , "have the right to live in peace without permanent new Arab blackmails." Support for Israel
6264-526: The company's perceived alignment with American interests. Furthermore, an article in Foreign Policy has critiqued Axel Springer SE for a history of compromising journalistic ethics to support right-wing causes, implying a longstanding pattern of bias in its publications. Upon acquisition of Insider in 2015, and again in 2021 with Politico, Mathias Döpfner allegedly stated that staff would need to adhere to Axel Springer's principles, including support for
6372-411: The company's values and the importance of European integration, especially among younger Poles, was interpreted by critics as editorial interference. In March 2021, Der Spiegel reported accusations that the editor of Bild, Julian Reichelt , had promoted several young female employees in exchange for sex and sought to buy their silence before dismissing them. This was followed up by a similar report in
6480-557: The constitutionally guaranteed freedom of the press. But official steps towards decartelisation were successfully pre-empted by Springer's sale of a half dozen of his lesser titles. A critical test of his ability to manage and deflect concern over media concentration might have come only with the introduction of commercial television, and that was delayed in West Germany until 1984, the year before he died. ( Willi Brandt recalls that his "friendly relations" with Axel Springer first suffered in
6588-625: The core of Bild's now declining readership (down 800,000 by 1972) voted for Brandt regardless. Significantly Springer, who had always cited the "poll" at the newspaper and magazine kiosk ( Abstimmung am Kiosk ) as the ultimate justification for his journalism, no matter how controversial, proved willing to adjust. He moved, or parted company with, those in his employ who had been attacking Brandt from ever more extreme right-wing positions. Among these were, Peter Boenisch , chief editor at Bild ; and Welt am Sonntag columnist Willi Schlamm (a former Austrian Communist and an American John Bircher ). Once it
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#17328482040806696-518: The crimes of the Nazis, the victims of his Stalinist hosts were being made to kneel by rifle butts to the groin. Springer's journalism did not explore the history of the Nazi-era in the manner of Der Spiegel or Stern . Bild editor-in-chief Rudolf Michael (1952–58) was against "educating the readers". Nevertheless, under Karl-Heinz Hagen (1960–62) the newspaper began, sensationally as was its wont, to report on trials of Nazi war criminals, including in 1961
6804-474: The devil . Strauss visited communist Albania on 21 August 1984, while Enver Hoxha , the ruler from the end of World War II until his death in 1985, was still in power. Strauss was one of the few Western leaders, if not the only one, to visit the isolationist Albania in decades. This fuelled speculation that Strauss might be preparing the way for diplomatic links between Albania and West Germany and, indeed, relations were established in 1987. In 2017, Strauss
6912-459: The district) of Schongau by the American military government and was involved in founding the local party organization of the Christian Social Union in Bavaria (CSU). Strauss became a member of the first Bundestag (Federal Parliament) in 1949. In 1953 Strauss became Federal Minister for Special Affairs in the second cabinet of Chancellor Konrad Adenauer , in 1955 Federal Minister of Nuclear Energy, and in 1956 Defence Minister, charged with
7020-485: The early 1960s when, as governing mayor of West Berlin, he had declined Springer's request to help him open the Federal Republic to commercial television by licensing a local broadcaster). A more serious embarrassment for Springer were the investigations of journalist Günter Wallraff . In 1977, his employment, undercover, as an editor for Bild led to exposés, ( Der Aufmacher – a pun meaning both "Lead Story" and "the one who opens" – and Zeugen der Anklage , "Witnesses for
7128-436: The education of the troops, at the antiaircraft artillery school in Altenstadt Air Base , near Schongau . He held the rank of Oberleutnant at the end of the war. In 1945 he served as translator for the U.S. Army. He called himself Franz Strauß until soon after the war when he started using his middle name Josef as well. After the war, in 1945, he was appointed deputy Landrat (chief executive and representative of
7236-446: The entire political left. His association with several large-scale scandals made many politicians distance themselves from him. His policies contributed to changing Bavaria from an agrarian state to one of Germany's leading industry centres, and one of the wealthiest regions of Germany. According to British diplomat Richard Hiscocks: Strauss is without doubt one of the most remarkable personalities that has yet emerged in Germany since
7344-415: The expropriation of Springer's press empire) was shot on the street in West Berlin by the young right-wing extremist Josef Bachmann , the cry again was that Bild was complicit ("Bild schoss mit!"). Serious unrest followed . Demonstrators tried to storm the Springer house in Berlin and set fire to Bild delivery vans. The Hamburg print shop was besieged to prevent the paper leaving the presses, and in Munich
7452-436: The federal cabinet in different positions between 1953 and 1969 and minister-president of the state of Bavaria from 1978 until 1988. Strauss is also credited as a co-founder of European aerospace conglomerate Airbus . After the 1969 federal elections , West Germany's CDU/CSU alliance found itself out of power for the first time since the founding of the Federal Republic. At this time, Strauss became more identified with
7560-480: The financial challenges faced at the outset of his publishing venture, suggesting the necessity of external funding for the company's rapid growth led Kruip to believe that the allegations of CIA financial support are credible. As of 2001, the Axel Springer SE names "solidarity with the libertarian values of the United States of America" as one of its core principles on its website. This explicit stance has led to critiques from scholars and independent observers regarding
7668-433: The first half of 2023. Following US private-equity firm KKR 's majority-stake acquisition in 2020, Axel Springer’s revenues have increased by a total of approximately €1 billion. The company, including its subsidiaries, joint ventures, and licenses, operates in more than 40 countries. The company was started in 1946 by journalist Axel Springer . Mathias Döpfner became its CEO in 2002. In 2004, Axel Springer company,
7776-488: The government's lack of preparedness. In a statement he was later obliged to recant, Strauss denied himself initiating the police action. Although Augstein was a liberal critic, Springer offered his presses, teletypes and office space so Der Spiegel could keep on publishing. It was, however, at the cost of further access to Die Welt that columnist Sebastian Haffner took to the Süddeutsche Zeitung to pronounce on
7884-609: The largest publishing house in Europe at that time, controlled the largest German market share for daily newspapers; 23.6%, largely because its flagship tabloid Bild is the highest-circulation newspaper in Europe with a daily readership exceeding 12 million. By 2022, the company got 10.6% of the market share in Germany. October 2022 data indicates that Axel Springer's BILD brands attract approximately six million unique users daily, totaling up to 40 million unique users per month. IVW 's data from June 2023 shows BILD receiving 504 million monthly visits and WELT achieving 127 million. In
7992-581: The main source of antisemitism , ignoring that the majority of antisemitic incidents are actually caused by the far-right . She also criticized the company for uncritically adopting Israel's talking points on the Middle East conflict , to the disadvantage of Palestinians . Axel Springer has also been accused of making profits from illegal settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Axel Springer’s Israeli classified ads website Yad2
8100-758: The media group. Under the arrangement, Friede Springer sold a 4.1% stake to Dopfner and gifted him 15% more- bringing Dopfner’s direct stake of the company to 22%. She also transferred voting rights to Dopfner for her remaining 22% in the business. In October of the same year, the company expanded its Berlin headquarters with the completion of the Axel Springer Campus, a cube-shaped office building designed by Rem Koolhaas and OMA . In October 2021, an article in The New York Times reported accusations of sexual misconduct, sexual discrimination and questionable business practices at Axel Springer SE. A day later,
8208-454: The motorsport that I loved so much.” Other NSKK members who would go on to occupy prominent positions in the post-war Federal Republic offered similar careerist explanations, among them Springer's future rival in publishing Franz Burda , Franz Josef Strauss who was to lead Bavaria 's ruling Christian Social Union , and (a purportedly inactive party member) Kurt Georg Kiesinger , West Germany's third Chancellor . Contrary to their picture of
8316-525: The national broadsheet Die Welt , a loss maker but a rival to the newspapers of record , Die Zeit and the Süddeutsche Zeitung . In 1956, from the Jewish family to which it had been restored after the war, Springer took a 26% share in the prestigious Ullstein publishing house in Berlin. He became the majority shareholder at the end of 1959 acquiring, among other titles, the Berliner Morgenpost . Springer celebrated Ullstein as having been, in
8424-494: The paper. The German Press Council issued Bild six reprimands. After extended legal action brought by Springer, a Federal court in 1981 ruled in favour of Mr. Wallraff. It said his writings had focused on "an aberration in journalism, the discussion of which should be of great interest to the public." Injunctions nonetheless prevented publication of some of the most damning material. Un-redacted copies of Wallraff original reporting were not published until 2012. Springer maintained
8532-420: The planes, due to Boeing suing Lockheed over the lost German business. In a Senate hearing in the U.S., it was admitted by Lockheed associates that the funds were disbursed to Strauss. In spite of this fact, Strauss was never indicted in Germany due to his influence. Lockheed at that time was on the brink of collapse; the German contract was key to the company's survival. The F-104G's development had been expensive;
8640-498: The publisher fired the editor-in-chief of Bild . In July 2024, reports emerged that Axel Springer and private equity group KKR were in talks to potentially split the media conglomerate. The proposed deal would separate the group's media assets, including Politico, Business Insider, Bild, and Die Welt, from its digital classifieds operations such as StepStone and Aviv. The split was confirmed in September 2024 and Axel Springer became
8748-573: The publishing house Die Welt, including the daily paper Die Welt and the Sunday paper Welt am Sonntag . Construction on the company headquarters in Hamburg began in 1950 and was completed in 1956. In 1956, Axel Springer secured a blocking minority in Ullstein Verlag , and three years later he took over the company completely. ullstein bild is a brand for the photo collection (since 1877), now under Axel Springer Syndication GmbH. This
8856-510: The regional politics of Bavaria. While he ran for the chancellorship as the candidate of the CDU/CSU in 1980 , for the rest of his life Strauss never again held federal office. From 1978 until his death in 1988, he was the head of the Bavarian government. His last two decades were marked by a fierce rivalry with CDU chairman Helmut Kohl . Born in Munich on 6 September 1915, as the second child of
8964-399: The rivalry between Kohl and Strauss persisted for years, once the CDU/CSU was able to take power in 1982, it was Kohl who became chancellor. He remained in power well beyond Strauss's death. Defunct Defunct Strauss wrote a book called The Grand Design , in which he set forth his views of how the future unification of Europe might be achieved. As an aerospace enthusiast, Strauss
9072-456: The same time, the East Germans were so impressed by the seeming power of Bild that between 1957 and 1973 they attempted, with different tabloid formats, to sell their own their NEUE Bild Zeitung to West Germans crossing the border. Springer's efforts, which his writers may have understood as a general means of discrediting the Social Democrats, were unavailing. Blue-collar workers who formed
9180-494: The suppression of a critical press with the resources of the state. Strauss had no choice but to admit that he had lied to the parliament, and was forced to resign. Strauss himself was exonerated by the courts on the charge of acting against the constitution. Strauss was appointed minister of the treasury again in 1966, in the cabinet of Kurt Georg Kiesinger . In cooperation with the SPD minister for economy, Karl Schiller , he developed
9288-475: The then British-controlled Die Welt after protests from Britain's Labour government and from the Social Democrats then governing Hamburg. At Die Welt Springer allowed Zehrer to entertain the idea of an Austrian solution for Germany. In 1955, Austria had regained its unity and independence through a four-power agreement guaranteeing the country's non-alignment and neutrality. In January 1958, Springer travelled with Zehrer to Moscow. Before departing he told to
9396-586: The traditional media business model by offering new ways for people to access news and information, and have posed a significant challenge to traditional media companies like Axel Springer. Franz Josef Strauss Franz Josef Strauss (German: Strauß [fʁants ˈjoːzɛf ˈʃtʁaʊs] ; 6 September 1915 – 3 October 1988) was a German politician. He was the long-time chairman of the Christian Social Union in Bavaria (CSU) from 1961 until 1988, member of
9504-463: The underdog and the little man", and perfected a formula he launched on the national market in 1952 with Bild Zeitung . Fed a tabloid mix of sensation, scandal, celebrity, sports and horoscopes, the Bild readership peaked in the mid-1960s at 4.5 million. It had the largest circulation of any newspaper in Western Europe or North America. Bild allowed Springer the luxury of his 1953 acquisition,
9612-417: The violation of press freedom and constitutional norms. Adenauer appears to have been sufficiently convinced of Springer's political reliability, that when in October 1963 he resigned as chancellor , he suggested (perhaps playfully) to Bild Editor-in-Chief Peter Boenisch that the publisher might be the "politician" best fitted to continue his policies. The Spiegel affair ignited youth protest and brought
9720-512: The wake of the Spiegel affair . Rudolf Augstein , owner and editor-in-chief of the influential Der Spiegel magazine, published German defense information that Strauss's department alleged was top secret. He was arrested on Strauss's request and was held for 103 days. On 19 November, the five FDP ministers of the cabinet resigned, demanding that Strauss be fired. This put Chancellor Adenauer himself at risk. He found himself publicly accused of backing
9828-428: The war and, from a democratic point of view, the most dangerous…. he has great ambition and combines with it the advantages of considerable intellectual gifts, an exceptional memory, immense resilience and capacity for work, and the ability to make quick decisions....On the other hand, these positive qualities are offset by equally pronounced defects. The unscrupulousness of his political methods exceeds even Adenauer’s and
9936-648: The west. On that basis, he refused any recognition that might "normalise" the East German SED regime. When the Wall went up in Berlin in 1961, Springer built his 22-storey headquarters flush up against it in the centre of the city, so that every day it might look over, and be seen from, what his writers regularly referred to as the Soviet Occupation Zone (German: Sowjetische Besatzungszone or SBZ ). While dissenters, such as Sebastian Haffner concluded that there
10044-466: Was Minister-President of Bavaria , serving his rotation as president of the German Bundesrat in 1983–84. After his defeat in the 1980 federal election, he retreated to commenting on federal politics from Bavaria. In the following years, he was the most visible critic of Kohl's politics in his own political camp, even after Kohl ascended to the chancellorship. In 1983, he was primarily responsible for
10152-543: Was Jewish. They divorced in 1938. While the divorce papers list Springer's infidelity as grounds (he would have five wives over the course of his 73 years), by 1938 it was clear that his marriage to a person classified, under the new race laws , as a "half-Jew", a Mischling , would bar him as an editor and publisher. Springer would later support both Meyer and her mother, who survived the Theresienstadt Ghetto . Springer later commented: "I cannot say I didn't know what
10260-475: Was a key player in the creation of Airbus in the 1970s. He served as chairman of Airbus in the late 1980s, until his death in 1988; he saw the company win a lucrative but controversial (see Airbus affair ) contract to supply planes to Air Canada just before his death. Munich's new airport, the Franz Josef Strauß Airport , was named after him in 1992. From 1978 until his death in 1988, Strauss
10368-516: Was able to ride out public criticism of his editorial ethics and market dominance. Springer engaged in private diplomacy in Moscow in 1958 and, with greater recognition, in Jerusalem in 1966 and 1967. In addition to promotion and defence of the values of the "Western family of nations" and NATO , Springer declared "reconciliation of Jews and Germans and support for the vital rights of the State of Israel " to be
10476-459: Was accompanied by strong protests from the population, which he described as hardly more dangerous than a bicycle spoke factory . The ecclesiastical resistance in particular, which met primarily at the Franziskus-Marterl , was a nuisance for Strauss and he explained that anyone who confuses people, whoever causes them to feel insecure, excited and afraid for no reason, is doing the work of
10584-596: Was clear that the Christian Democrats would not reverse course on recognition, Bild did begin, albeit in quotation marks, to refer to East Germany as the GDR (the German Democratic Republic ). From August 1971 Günter Prinz, Boenisch's successor at Bild, restored the paper's circulation by returning to a less politically charged "mix of sex, facts und fiction". Springer's son, Axel Springer Jr. (1941–1980),
10692-548: Was criminal in the most sickening way." In fact, Ohnesorg, who had never attended a demonstration before, had been shot in the back while trying to leave the demonstration. The years 1972 and 1973 saw the building of the offset-printing plant in Essen-Kettwig. 1984 witnessed the official opening of the offset printing facility in Ahrensburg near Hamburg. In 1985, 49% of the company was offered for public subscription, marking
10800-577: Was followed in 1959 by the purchase of the newspaper Berliner Morgenpost . When Springer took over the Ullstein publishing house in December 1959, the B.Z. also became its property. Two days before the end of the Soviet ultimatum in Berlin , Axel Springer laid the foundation stone for the new publishing headquarters on 25 May 1959. The official opening of the Berlin headquarters took place in 1966. After
10908-647: Was happening. In 1933 I stood on the Kurfürstendamm in Berlin and watched Nazi Storm Troopers beating up old Jews. I was a young man, and I couldn't do anything about it. But I never forgot it". In 1934, Springer joined the National Socialist Motorist Corps ( Nationalsozialistisches Kraftfahrkorps , NSKK). He later claimed that this was to secure "a Nazi-uniformed buffer" for his family "in an organization that did not make any major ideological commitments and that allowed politics to be combined with
11016-608: Was honored with the Albanian National Flag Order , while a city square holds his name in Tirana. On 1 October 1988, Strauss collapsed while out hunting with Johannes, 11th Prince of Thurn and Taxis , in the Thurn and Taxis forests, east of Regensburg . He died in a Regensburg hospital on 3 October without having regained consciousness. He was 73. Strauss married Marianne Zwicknagl [ de ] in 1957. She died in
11124-477: Was now no alternative to formal recognition, Springer was unyielding. He condemned the accommodationist Ostpolitik pursued from 1969 by Brandt. Springer's hostility to the SED regime was reciprocated. Over the course of two years from 1968 to 1970, GDR state television aired a lavishly-produced 10-hour miniseries, Ich – Axel Cäsar Springer , depicting the media magnate as the puppet of a secretive, post-war Nazi cabal. At
11232-700: Was of the Czechoslovak crisis (Schmidt assuring Springer that it was "impossible" that the Soviets would repeat the events of Budapest 1956 and crush the Prague Spring with tanks). On 19 May 1972, the Red Army Faction (the "Baader Meinhof Gang") bombed Springer's Hamburg offices, injuring 17 employees, two of them seriously. Springer critics regretted the escalation, but accepted the thesis of The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum, or: How violence develops and where it can lead , Heinrich Böll 's 1974 novel in which violence
11340-470: Was related to new journalistic methods and formats that catered to public tastes, but charged Springer with using that position of preeminence to mix "news and suggestive commentary". He might have "fewer problems" if he restructured his publishing house on the model of private foundations or public media institutions. In the event, when finally Springer consented to meet with Schmidt in August 1968, their discussion
11448-415: Was said that Federal ministers began each day by "combing Die Welt for signs of whether Springer was smiling of frowning on them." If only in its headline, the front page of Bild was also seen as "agenda setting". In 1968, a government commission concluded that the degree of control Springer had achieved over the publishing industry in West Germany (40% of newspapers and about 20% of magazines) threatened
11556-408: Was stationed. Hauser worked for U.S. Intelligence and Strauss was Hauser's translator. They were good friends, which Strauss later denied, in a denial belied by the fact that Strauss had attended Hauser's wedding. As the allegations were not corroborated, the issue was dropped. It was known at the time that a Senate hearing in the U.S. revealed that Lockheed associates paid Strauss a bribe to purchase
11664-542: Was the photographer and journalist "Sven Simon", and was for a period chief editor of Welt am Sonntag . In 1980, at the age of 38, he took his own life. He is perhaps best remembered for his iconic picture of Willi Brandt kneeling on 7 December 1970 before the memorial to Ghetto Uprising in Warsaw . The occasion of Brandt's visit to Poland was the signing of the Treaty of Warsaw between West Germany and Poland . This recognised
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