Nine Entertainment has confirmed that 85 staff from its publishing division are due to exit the business on redundancy packages, concluding the restructuring process foreshadowed by the media business in June.

It has been reported elsewhere all 85 redundancies were voluntary, however Mi3 understands that is not the case, though has not yet been able to confirm the split of voluntary and involuntary packages taken.

The cuts, which were not limited to editorial roles, have hit mastheads including the Australian Financial Review, the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age. Many of those departing are senior journalists, per reports in the Guardian, including the Age's social affairs editor, Jewel Topsfield, North American correspondent, Farrah Tomazin, Indigenous affairs journalist Jack Latimore, and the culture editor, Osman Faruqi, amongst others.

Leaving the Sydney Morning Herald newsroom is Helen Pitt, Andrew Hornery, and commercial property editor, Carolyn Cummins, while the AFR loses legal editor Michael Pelly, energy, climate change and innovation writer Ben Potter, and the senior correspondent Aaron Patrick.

In a statement shared to Mi3, a Nine spokesperson said: "As foreshadowed in June, we have been working with our people in reshaping the Publishing business to ensure a sustainable future in response to the challenging advertising market and collapse of the Meta deal.

"We have now concluded this process, with around 85 people from our newsrooms, print operations and audience and commercial growth divisions regrettably leaving the business over coming months.

"We will be providing support for all employees transitioning from the business. Every one of these people depart with our gratitude and appreciation for their contributions to Nine's world-class mastheads."

The conclusion of the redundancy process comes on the background of a turbulent few months for the Nine, with as many as 500 publishing staff taking part in industrial action in the first week of the network's Paris Olympics coverage - the first of eight years' worth of Olympic events the business had spent $305 million to secure.

Tensions had reached boiling point after Nine boss Mike Sneesby told staffers in June that as many as 200 roles would be slashed across the business, in the first major bout of redundancies since the 2017 Fairfax merger that saw an exodus of more than 100 staff.

At the time, Nine Publishing managing director Tory Maguire flagged at the time that 70-90 of those roles would come from the company's newsrooms, while Director of News and Current Affairs Fiona Dear confirmed 38 roles would be lost from broadcast news teams. The following month, another 40 roles were cut from Nine's youth publishing arm, Pedestrian Group, as the business restructured to focus on it's owned brands. The local operations for the likes of Vice, Refinery29, Gizmodo, Kotaku, and Lifehacker were ceased as a result.