Two debt restructurings last year still left Houghton Mifflin Harcourt parent company Education and Media Publishing Group (EMPG) straining to sustain their debt obligations and covenants, and reports from Ireland indicate yet another restructuring is in the works that would wipe out equity-holders entirely and turn the company over to its secured lenders. Investors losing out would include the financial genius behind the $9 billion worth of acquisitions, Barry O’Callaghan, whose interest was reduced to about 20 percent of the company last August. (He also made himself ceo of HMH last year when Tony Lucki wisely retired.) But it also […]
Archives for January 2010
Bookselling: Bodhi Tree to Close
Owners of Los Angeles-based Bodhi Tree Bookstore Phil Thompson and Stan Madson reportedly told their staff last week that the store will be shutting its doors in a year’s time” after almost 40 years in business, LA Weekly reports. With both owners in their 70s, they decided to sell the building on Melrose Avenue to a real estate developer.LAW
People
Direct Brands has hired David Gitow as chief marketing officer and Alan Katz as evp, business development, the first major appointments under new ceo Deborah Fine. Gitow was cmo at both BN.com and Barnes & Noble, and in a long time stretch at Time, Inc. founded and ran Time, Inc. Home Entertainment. Katz has had a long career in magazine publishing, including executive positions at Vanity Fair and New York. BookEnds Literary Agency co-founder Jacky Sach will retire from publishing after 10 years as an agent for “new opportunities.” Sach began her publishing career in 1985 at Berkley. BookEnds will […]
Founder Buys Back Stone Bridge; Quirk Announces 'Android Karenina'; Jacky Sach to Retire, and More
Founder of Stone Bridge Press Peter Goodman has reacquired 100 percent of the company’s shares from its Japanese owner, IBC Publishing of Tokyo. Goodman sold Stone Bridge to Japanese book distributor Yohan in 2005 and passed to its one-time subsidiary IBC in 2007 right before Yohan declared bankruptcy. Goodman, who has been an executive at Stone Bridge since its founding in 1989, will continue to lead the company as publisher and editor-in-chief from their current offices near North Berkeley, CA. He notes, “The Japanese owners at IBC have always been generous in spirit, and they did the best they could […]
Aletheia Kept Building BN Stake
Aletheia Research and Management continued their heaving buying of Barnes & Noble stock in the final week of 2009, filing with the SEC yesterday to disclose that their share in the bookseller had risen to 13.12 percent of all shares outstanding. The company’s purchases throughout December were all made at prices in excess of Barnes & Noble’s current price, now trading below $18 a share.SEC filing
Books In the News: Game Change Stays at Top of the News Cycle, But No eBook
John Heilemann and Mark Halperin’s GAME CHANGE releases today, after a number of continuous days of headline-making tidbits. The AP reports that Harper has gone back to press twice, bringing the initial run of 75,000 copies up to 155,000 copies in print. Both Amazon and BN.com are out of stock for now, promising delivery in one to three weeks, and the book turns out to be one of those titles for which no ebook version is available to fulfill that instand demand. Multiple “reviewers” at both sites have expressed confusion and dismay that no ebook is available. For “quick reads” […]