Informa Plc, which became the world’s largest exhibitions organiser in 2018 with its £3.8bn acquisition of UBM, has begun divesting non-core operations with the $100m sale of its life sciences portfolio to MJH Associates. The New Jersey-based publisher of Pharmacy Times, Dentist’s Money Digest, and Contemporary Clinic (advised by Oaklins DeSilva + Phillips), now claims…
Penske gets 100% of Rolling Stone
The privately-owned Penske Media Corporation, of New York (publisher of Women’s Wear Daily, Variety, Deadline, Robb Report and almost 20 other magazine-centric brands) has purchased the remaining 49% stake in the 52-year-old Rolling Stone from Singapore-based BandLab Technologies. The deal gives it full ownership of the magazine including the international editions (formerly been managed by…
AgriBriefing prepares for the big time
It is more than six months since the London-based Horizon Capital (formerly Lyceum) hired advisers to find a buyer for AgriBriefing. The increasingly international B2B specialist had been launched in 2010 as Briefing Media, by Neil Thackray. He had started out by selling UK recruitment advertising for Reed Business Information before becoming a CEO in B2B…
Boat industry mag rocks on
Magazine conglomerates are part of the past and not just because print audiences have been eclipsed by digital. The London-based predecessors of TI Media (IPC Media and Time Inc UK) built profitability through the scale economies of printing, distribution and sales. As the company’s new private equity owners shuffle through their diverse, wobbly portfolio trying…
Immediate Media buys UK exhibitions
The UK-based magazines group Immediate Media has plunged deeper into live events with the £10m acquisition of Upper Street Events. It is the organiser of consumer exhibitions including The Cycle Show, the Knitting and Stitching shows, Festival of Quilts, Country Living Fairs, Adventure Travel Show and The London Cruise Show. The events are said to…
Schibsted: new era for online classifieds
Schibsted has paid €100m to acquire the 10% of Spanish classifieds group SCM that it did not already own. The deal comes just ahead of the Norwegian company’s demerger of its online classifieds outside Scandinavia. SCM, whose brands include Milanuncios, Coches, InfoJobs, Fotocasa and Habitaclia, has a leading position in the Spanish market and grew…
Reed Exhibitions buys Mack Brooks
Reed Exhibitions is buying the high-rated, UK-based Mack Brooks for a price believed to be some £200m. The privately-owned Brooks was established in 1965 and holds more than 30 business-to-business events in 14 countries, across airport technology, chemicals, packaging, and fasteners. The company, whose major brands include Euro Blech, InPrint, RailTex, FastenerFair, InterAirport and ChemSpec, has long been one of the UK’s most…
Discovery snaps up UK cycling specialist
In a deal which underlines both the increasing value of specialist-enthusiast content and the fusion of online and broadcast media, the $13bn Discovery Inc has acquired control of the cycling digital Play Sports Group (PSG). The UK-based company produces over 1,000 online videos annually on YouTube. It gets 45m monthly video views, 3.1m subscribers and 5.7m social followers for…
CloserStill pushes exhibition prices even higher
CloserStill Media, the 10-year-old London-based organiser of exhibitions principally in the healthcare, learning technologies and medical sectors, has been acquired by Providence Equity Partners for £340m. The price, based on an estimated 2018 operating profit of some £15m, is a multiplier of perhaps 22 (and more than 8 x revenue), a new high in a…
Our Top 10 in 2018
If you want some festive (re-) reading, here are links to our 10 most popular stories in the most successful year yet of Flashes & Flames: How Meredith upstaged Time Inc What now for the world’s biggest magazine? Can Daily Mail beat the family curse? Has Future (finally) found its way? Why Reed Exhibitions may be…
