Independent News & Media (IN&M), the newspaper group led by Sir Anthony O'Reilly, has agreed a 15-year printing deal with News International Ltd.
IN&M will publish a range of News International titles via its Belfast Telegraph subsidiary. Among the titles to be published will be the Sun and the News of the World. According to print industry sources, the contract would be worth in excess of €5 million a year.
The Belfast Telegraph also has contracts to print the Daily and Sunday Mirror, the Sunday Business Post, the Sunday People and the Daily Telegraph.
The new agreement comes into effect in 2007 and extends an existing contract between the two companies. However, as part of the new contract the Belfast Telegraph will be printing the entire island of Ireland print run of the News of the World, which amounts to 200,000 extra copies a week.
A statement from IN&M said the deal was the "largest print contract ever awarded on the island of Ireland". A large investment has been made in the Belfast Telegraph in recent years by IN&M.
Several other titles owned by News International, including the Sunday Times, are printed at its own plant in Kells, Co Meath.
The printing operations of IN&M generate a lot of cash for the company, but much of the business involves printing in-house titles. This week one of its largest southern printing operations, Terenure Printers Ltd, revealed it had lost the contract to print the Daily Express and Express on Sunday.
