TINDLE Newspapers, owners of the Herald Series of newspapers covering south-west Surrey and East Hampshire, has acquired four titles from Johnston Press on the Isle of Man.

Headed by Sir Ray Tindle, the Farnham-based independent newspaper group has bought The Isle of Man Examiner, The Isle of Man Courier, the Manx Independent and the popular TT?News motorcycling magazine for £4.25m.

Sir Ray said he was “delighted” with the acquisition of the long-established island newspapers – the Examiner dates to 1880 and the Courier to 1884 – and added that they had obviously been well managed and excellently edited.

“Buying a profitable local weekly set up such as the Isle of Man trio is certainly a departure from our early days when, without much cash, we mostly bought papers that were in trouble, or we we had to launch them ourselves,” added Sir Ray.