Iconic Time magazine sold for $190 Million to Salesforce founder Marc Benioff, wife

The magazine is being acquired by Salesforce co-founder and his wife as a personal purchase.

Reuters photo

WASHINGTON: The iconic TIME Magazine will be bought for $190 million by American billionaire internet entrepreneur Marc Benioff and his wife Lynne Benioff.

In a statement, Meredith Corp announced that the magazine being acquired by Salesforce co-founder and his wife as a personal purchase.

“I could not be more thrilled that Marc and Lynne Benioff will be the new owners of TIME,” said the magazine's editor-in-chief, Edward Felsenthal, said in a statement.

The Benioffs will hold TIME as a family investment and will have no connection to Salesforce, the software company Marc founded in 1999, explained Felsenthal. The couple will not be involved in the day-to-day operations or journalistic decisions at TIME. Those decisions will continue to be made by the magazine's current executive leadership team.

Meredith had completed the purchase of TIME along with other publications of Time Inc. earlier this year.

“ From the first moments we sat down with Marc and Lynne to discuss TIME’s future, we knew that this was not just a meeting of minds and business goals, it was a confluence of purpose. The Benioffs have a profound commitment to community and to finding solutions to some of society’s most complex problems, whether it’s building children’s hospitals or tackling homelessness. They are also committed, as TIME is, to the sharing and debating of competing ideas and to journalism of the highest quality,” he added.

“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,” tweeted Marc Benioff.

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. https://t.co/TsbcXhO1OU

— Marc Benioff (@Benioff) September 16, 2018

Meredith, the publisher of People and Better Homes & Gardens magazines, had put four TIME Inc. publications up for sale earlier this year. Negotiations for the sale of the three other publications Fortune, Money and Sports Illustrated still on.