The head of the company which owns newspaper titles including the Irish Independent and Sunday Independent, says he expects printed daily papers to be phased out within the next seven to ten years.
Peter Vandermeersch told RTÉ's This Week programme that Mediahuis is preparing to become a "digital only" company.
"We will probably print some Saturday, Sunday or weekly products but during the week print will disappear all over the place, all over Europe."
He said a plan to increase subscriptions to its news website independent.ie from its current base of 70,000 up to 100,000 subscribers by the year 2025 is probably not ambitious enough.
"We have to grow faster there," he said.
"In three years, we went from zero to 70,000, but if we want to replace the hundreds of thousands of people buying a paper we have to go to 200-250,000...in the next five to seven years."
Mediahuis Ireland owns titles including the Irish Independent, Sunday Independent, The Sunday World, the Belfast Telegraph as well as local papers including The Kerryman and Drogheda Independent.
Mr Vandermeersch said he is most worried about the future for local newspapers "because the scale of these local papers is so small".
"The future of these local papers is in danger, that's why in Mediahuis I think we have to do what we do in Belgium, that local journalism is to be found on national websites."
"On the website of the Indo, our ambition is that you would find the news Kerry, of Dingle of Greystones…wherever."
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He said the Government should be most worried about the survival of local newspapers, which play an important role in reporting on local courts, and local government.
However, he said he has concerns about the idea of the Government stepping in to fund local newspapers directly.
"We are a bit afraid of that because funding means control, or a form of control, but one way or another there should be support for local newspapers."
He suggested measures similar to the VAT reduction for newspapers might be needed to aid local journalism.
Mr Vandermeersch also said it is not fair that RTÉ receives subsidies, as well as advertising revenues, and provides its online news content for free.
"We have to do the same [as RTÉ] but behind a paywall."
He said in other countries public broadcasters are obliged to give some of their content, such as images to other websites, because they are already paid for by the taxpayer.
"We say it would be fair if sports rights for example, which RTÉ has, or similar things, were given to the private sector."
Earlier this week, Mediahuis Ireland announced a voluntary redundancy scheme for some of its editorial staff, however Mr Vandermeesch said he does not know how many job cuts will be made.
He also said he does not yet know whether the organisation will seek redundancies in other areas, including among journalists at the group.
