Axel Springer Verlag was founded by Axel Springer in Hamburg in 1946. Today, the company is a leading international media and technology company operating in more than 40 countries. In Europe and Germany, Axel Springer is one of the largest media companies alongside Bertelsmann. In addition to Bild and Bild am Sonntag, Axel Springer also publishes Welt and Welt am Sonntag as well as the TV channel Welt, Business Insider, Politico and the US newsletter Morning Brew. Axel Springer holds a stake in Media Pioneer and owns the job portal Stepstone and the AVIV Group with the property portal Immoscout. The publishing house also owns Bonial, Idealo and Awin. Axel Springer SE is headquartered in Berlin and now has a branch in New York City, USA. In June 2019, Axel Springer concluded an agreement with the US investment company KKR. KKR announced a voluntary takeover offer of 63 euros per share, valuing the company at 6.8 billion euros. Friede Springer and Mathias Döpfner retained their shares. KKR plans to reorganise the Group and sell the shares at a profit after around 5 to 7 years. After two acceptance periods, KKR reached a stake of 42.5% in August 2019. As a result, the free float fell below 5% and the share was excluded from the MDAX in August 2019. The share has no longer been listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange since 6 April 2020 and trading on the OTC market on most German stock exchanges was discontinued.