Bob Sauerberg will be stepping down from his role as CEO of Condé Nast U.S., which has started a search for a chief executive officer with more global experience as the company merges its domestic and international operations.
Jonathan Newhouse, CEO of Condé Nast International, will also be exiting his current role, but will remain on as chairman for the company. He and Steve Newhouse announced the upcoming exit Tuesday morning in a memo to staff obtained by TheWrap.
“[O]ur aspirations are no longer best served by our historical structure of running two separate companies,” the two wrote in the memo. “We have concluded that the time is right for us to combine our U.S. and international companies to realize the full potential of Condé Nast for our audiences and our business partners.”
“Bob Sauerberg has helped steer Condé Nast through a time of enormous transformation in his distinguished 18-year career at the company,” the memo continued. “Under his leadership, the company has earned more National Magazine Awards than any competitor, five Pulitzer Prizes, an Emmy Award, a Peabody nomination, and multiple Academy Award nominations for its short-form digital content. We are truly grateful to Bob for all his significant accomplishments, and for his willingness to lead the company through the transition.”
Sauerberg, who joined Condé Nast in 2005 as executive VP, will continue as CEO of the U.S. division until the company finds a new global chief executive to fill his role.
Condé Nast — which publishes Vanity Fair, Wired, the New Yorker and GQ — will continue to be headquartered in New York and London, while its other senior executives, including Wolfgang Blau, president of the international division, will remain in their roles.
“Looking forward, the shift to one global company will help us realize our ambition to deliver the highest quality journalism, experiences and value to our audiences, advertisers and partners on all platforms by allowing us to more quickly transform ourselves to address their evolving needs and by enhancing the collaboration between colleagues around the world,” the memo concluded.
The news comes at a time when magazine publications have struggled to remain relevant in a digital age. Earlier this month, Condé Nast announced that it would cease regular print publication of Glamour, it’s women-focused magazine, which followed the ending of print editions of Self and Teen Vogue in 2017.