News Corp Axes ‘The Daily’, Originally an Apple Inc. (AAPL) iPad Exclusive

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While we don’t have specific up-to-date user statistics from News Corp, a letter from the Editor in July disclosed that The Daily had “100,000 paying subs who are renewing their subscriptions at a 98% rate,” which still implies that at a yearly operating cost of approximately $26 million, the publication was operating at a loss, no matter how innovative an experience it was on devices like Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)’s iPad. Using an average user rate of $39.99 a year, we can estimate that The Daily needed roughly 650,000 subscribers to break even.

Though it’s certainly sad to see a publication close its doors — especially with the quality that The Daily maintained — it makes sense from a profitability standpoint to fold its best aspects into The New York Post, which has traditionally had a much larger readership. Here’s an introductory video of the now defunct publication in case you’re interested:

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