Metal Hammer is saved! Before the Christmas break, we revealed the sad news that the legendary magazine's parent company went "into administration," which is essentially the British term for "bankruptcy." Over 70 staffers were laid off and not paid at all for December. It was not a fun time to work there.
But, Metal Hammer's previous publisher, Future Publishing has come to the rescue. The Guardian reports Future has acquired all the magazines, domain names, events, radio license and websites of Classic Rock, Metal Hammer, Prog, The Blues and The Golden Gods. But the real story here is how much, or how little they paid for it.
Future sold all of the assets they just bought back to Team Rock back in 2013 for a whopping £10.2 million. Earlier in the week, they bought everything back for £800,000. That's less than 10% of what Team Rock paid for it. Quite a deal for the folks at Future.
According to a post on TeamRock's website, they have already brought back the editors and art directors of the magazines to get sorted on upcoming issues and are in the process of contacting former editorial staffers and freelancers.
We're happy to see such an institution back in business and hope for its success.
