Fairfax Media Ltd chief executive Brian McCarthy has resigned from the company, the media group says.
It said non-executive director Greg Hywood had been appointed acting chief executive while a global executive search is conducted.
Fairfax chairman Roger Corbett said in a statement that Mr McCarthy, after discussions with the board, could not make a commitment to Fairfax for the next three to five years while the company implemented its recently announced strategic plan.
"We agreed that now, at the beginning of the implementation of the plan, it was appropriate time for the leadership change," Mr Corbett said.
Mr McCarthy said, in the same statement, he had been with Rural Press and then Fairfax for 34 years and would take a break before pursuing new business opportunities.
Mr Corbett said the board acknowledged Mr McCarthy's leadership steering the company through the global financial crisis, his successful drive for cultural change at the company and his stewardship of developing the strategic plan.
"Brian has set the company up for a very successful future and we thank him for his contribution," he said. Mr Corbett said Mr Hywood brought to his new role deep editorial and commercial experience.
"We are in a fortunate position to have someone of his calibre acting in this role," Mr Corbett said.
Mr Hywood is a Walkley Award-winning journalist and a former publisher and editor-in-chief of The Australian Financial Review, The Sydney Morning Herald/Sun Herald and The Age. He also has been a group publisher for Fairfax magazines.
Fairfax Media last month announced an overhaul of its management structure, cutting the number of its divisions from 11 to nine with the standalone digital business to be distributed across the company.
It also has created a new metropolitan media division, combining the print, online and classified operations of metropolitan newspapers The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Canberra Times, Fairfax Community Newspapers, and news websites in Perth and Brisbane.
At the time, Mr McCarthy said a search had begun for a chief executive to run the division, which is expected to generate 22 per cent of the company's $639 million annual earnings.
Earlier in November, Mr McCarthy told the company's annual general meeting that the vast majority of the company's business units were posting revenue growth. In August, Fairfax reported a net profit for the year to June 30 of $282.1 million compared to a net loss of $380.1 million the previous year when it wrote down the value of its mastheads.
The company said revenue slipped to $2.48 billion, from $2.6 billion in the previous corresponding period.
On an underlying basis, net profit was $278.7 million, up 23 per cent on the previous year, including a special preference share dividend, Fairfax shares were down three cents at $1.41.
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