Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, the billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Times, said this week he plans to take the storied West Coast newspaper public within the next year.
The move, first announced during an appearance on Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show” on Monday, comes amid a financially-turbulent time for the newspaper, which has been exacerbated in recent years by growing unrest among its editorial and opinion staffers.
During his TV appearance on Monday, Soon-Shiong said the public offering is intended to “democratize” the publication and allow the public to “take ownership” of its future.
“Whether you’re right, left, Democrat, Republican, you’re an American,” Soon-Shiong said. “So the opportunity for us to provide a paper that is the voices of the people, truly the voices of the people…we’re going to take LA Times public and allow the public to have ownership of this paper.”
Soon-Shiong confirmed that preparations for the public offering are already underway, though he did not offer specifics regarding the offering structure or how it might affect his personal control over the publication. The newspaper is currently held through Nant Capital, his private investment vehicle, which acquired the Times and San Diego Union-Tribune in 2018 from Tronc (formerly Tribune Publishing) in a deal worth nearly $500 million. He later sold the Union-Tribune to MediaNews Group in 2023.
The move to go public follows a difficult financial year for the Times, which reportedly lost $50 million in 2024, according to Adweek. Paid digital subscriptions have dwindled to just over 300,000, and the paper cut more than 20 percent of its newsroom staff last year.
Beyond its balance sheet, the Times has also faced internal discord under Soon-Shiong’s leadership. In recent years, the owner has intervened in the editorial board’s decision-making, most notably blocking an endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 general election against Donald Trump. A similar veto occurred in 2020, when the board was set to endorse Elizabeth Warren in the Democratic primary. The interference led to multiple high-profile resignations and a wave of subscription cancellations.
Soon-Shiong, a former surgeon and biotech entrepreneur who developed the cancer drug Abraxane, has publicly expressed interest in shifting the Times’ editorial stance to include more conservative viewpoints. “Unless you have truth and trust, I think we’re not going to have any healing in the country,” he said on The Daily Show. “Our institutions today — there’s so much distrust.”
Despite the internal friction, Soon-Shiong framed the initial public offering, or IPO, as a step toward greater public engagement with journalism.
“To me, this is really a wonderful opportunity for us to have the privilege of being an American,” he said. “I live this American dream. I’m an immigrant here, right?”
Whether the market shares his optimism remains to be seen. A history of steep losses and editorial instability may weigh heavily on investor confidence, even as Soon-Shiong touts the offering as a form of civic participation.
The full Daily Show conversation is below:
