Time Warner to Pay $475 Million To Buy Times Mirror Magazines

NEW YORK -- Time Warner Inc.'s Time Inc. publishing division has agreed to acquire Times Mirror Magazines for $475 million, a much higher price than initially anticipated.

The acquisition will beef up Time's Sports Illustrated unit, which largely missed the boom in extreme and niche sports. Time Warner will now add such titles as Golf, TransWorld Snowboarding and Ride BMX, a publication about stunt bikes.

Industry executives said the deal probably won't face antitrust scrutiny, despite Time Warner's pending merger with America Online Inc. Combined, the two magazine companies would have garnered 25% of magazine advertising dollars in 1999, according ...