Gannett buys more of CareerBuilder from Tribune

NEW YORK (Reuters) - USA Today publisher Gannett Co Inc has increased its stake in the CareerBuilder jobs website to 50.8 percent by buying a 10 percent stake for $135 million from Tribune Co, the two companies said on Wednesday.

The move comes as Tribune is selling some assets to help pay down billions of dollars in debt that the newspaper publisher took on as part of an $8.2 billion buyout led by real estate magnate Sam Zell last year.

After the sale, Tribune will own 30.8 percent of CareerBuilder, which competes with Monster Worldwide Inc's Monster.com. McClatchy Co owns 14.4 percent and Microsoft Corp owns 4 percent of CareerBuilder.

In August, Tribune reported a $4.5 billion quarterly loss after a write-down of the value of many of its newspapers and a payment of hundreds of millions of dollars in debt due later this year.

Declines in readership and advertising dollars have added to the pressure on Tribune to secure funds to avoid default, and it has also been planning to sell properties including the Chicago Cubs and the baseball team's home, Wrigley Field.

Gannett Chief Executive Craig Dubow said he did not plan on a shake-up of CareerBuilder.

"We are committed to CareerBuilder and want the team there to continue to do what they do best: grow the company, bring in revenues and deliver the best customer service in the jobs space," he said in a statement. "We don't expect any major changes."

Under the new ownership agreement, Gannett has three of the six seats on the CareerBuilder board of directors. Tribune and McClatchy have one seat each, and the CEO of CareerBuilder also has a seat.

(Reporting by Ritsuko Ando; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)