AUSTRALIA

Australian, Canadian Tycoons Team Up: Australia’s richest man, Kerry Packer, has joined a consortium with Canadian newspaper tycoon Conrad Black to bid for John Fairfax Group, Australia’s oldest media empire. Fairfax includes the Sydney Morning Herald. But the partners will be battling competing bids from Ireland’s Independent Newspapers and Jamison Equity of Australia and a government wary of giving Packer too much control of the country’s press. A top official has said the government may try to block Packer. Through his Consolidated Press Holdings Ltd., Packer has joined Black, chairman of Canada’s Hollinger Inc., and Hellman & Friedman Capital Partners of the United States to bid for Fairfax Group under a bidding vehicle named Tourang Ltd. Analysts have priced the Fairfax empire at $1.01 billion.