Sapa to close down after 76 years
VICTORY PARK – The South African Press Association to send out its last story at midnight on 31 March.
The South African Press Association (Sapa), the only strategic partner of PR Newswire and Business Wire for press release distribution in Sub-Saharan Africa, recently announced that it will cease all operations.
“After the disposal of the assets, the company will be liquidated and its operations will cease on 31 March, 2015,”chairperson Minette Ferreira said in a statement.
The Victory Park-based organisation has been in existence since 1938.
The organisation admits that it can no longer sustain itself on a non-profit model.
Ferreira said the board intended “ensuring the interests of all Sapa employees were correctly and meticulously attended to.
“In addition, current subscribers would in due course be briefed on the plans and would be approached directly by the operators of the new syndication business,” she said.
Thanks to their partnership with Sapa, PR Newswire and Business Wire were able to redistribute their clients’ press releases to around 70 media houses, mainly based in South Africa.
“We are sad to see one of our peers go. Some Sapa clients have already resorted to African Press Organisation (APO) to ensure the continuous distribution of their press releases in Africa.
APO has allocated resources to answer their every need, including Pan-African distribution reaching over 150 000 media professionals and 250 million Africa mobile subscribers,” said Nicolas Pompigne-Mognard, APO Founder and CEO.
APO is the creator of Africa Wire® , the newswire service for press release distribution and monitoring in Africa. This reaches over 50 000 media outlets, bloggers and social networks, and redistributes content to more than 50 African websites, as well as to Bloomberg Terminal, Thomson Reuters, LexisNexis, Dow Jones Factiva, 250 million mobile subscribers in 30 countries and more.
According to Pompigne-Mognard, APO Africa Wire® has a potential reach of 600 million people and guarantees the most efficient media influence in Africa; in turn, this is how APO’s clients can directly target audiences in all corners of the continent and the world.
