For years investors have disapproved of McGraw-Hill’s portfolio, which folds the S&P Credit Ratings Agency, Education, and other unrelated businesses under the same umbrella. Recent share pickups by activist hedge fund Jana Partners in tandem with the Ontario Teachers Pension Fund heightened calls for the company to break up, sell, or spin off some of its divisions – especially the education side, the largest group within the company. The WSJ first reported, with other outlets following with their own unnamed sources or “people briefed on the matter” that McGraw-Hill retained investment bank Evercore Partners to advise the company on a […]
Archives for August 2011
Legal News: Another Appeals Case Rules First Sale Doctrine Is US-Only; ‘The Shack’ Lawsuit Finally Settled
Just a few weeks after the Ninth Circuit ruled in a case featuring Costco’s sale of imported Omega watches that the first sale doctrine does not apply to imported goods, another ruling this week from the Second Circuit more forcefully confirms this conclusion – and this time it involves book sales. In a 2-1 decision, the court said Supap Kirtsaeng violated Wiley’s copyrights when he sold cheap foreign editions of the publishers’ textbooks in the US because first sale doctrine does not apply to books sold outside of the country. Any other conclusion would undercut a law already on the books […]
Liberty Media Now Favors Other Options Instead of Outright BN Buy
In the more than three months since Liberty Media stated its intention to buy a 70 percent stake in Barnes & Noble at 17 cents a share, further reports suggested that prospect had dimmed, or at least put on hold. Then on Wednesday morning a report by dealReporter – which has a hit-or-miss track record on such things – intimated that “constraints on financing had quieted deal talk” and that Liberty was leaning towards “a preferred share investment.” Per “two sources familiar with the situation and an industry banker following the situation,” the original deal wasn’t off the table, but […]
RR Donnelley To Acquire LibreDigital
RR Donnelley announced today that it has acquired digital content distribution and e-service provider LibreDigital for an undisclosed sum. President and ceo Thomas Quinlan said in a statement that buying LibreDigital will “extend RR Donnelley’s reach across the breadth of the supply chain.” This is the second company Donnelley has purchased this week, having also bought Sequence Personal, a provider of proprietary software that enables readers to select relevant content to be digitally produced as specialized publications. Earlier this summer Donnelley also acquired online writer services company Helium and Journalism Online. “With this acquisition we uniquely position RR Donnelley to […]
Self-Help Bestseller Tim Ferriss Sells New Book To Kirshbaum’s Amazon Imprint
Some days the biggest news happens in the deals section, and today is no exception with Amazon’s announcement that the still-untitled imprint headed by Larry Kirshbaum made its first buy, acquiring Timothy Ferriss’ latest self-help opus, THE FOUR-HOUR CHEF, for publication next year. (Our deals database has more information on the terms.) Previously Ferriss was published by Crown, and both of his earlier books, THE FOUR-HOUR WORKWEEK and THE FOUR-HOUR BODY, have been on the NYT bestseller lists for 84 and 33 weeks, respectively. Amazon’s release ceded most of the “future of publishing” rhetoric to Ferriss, who was quoted as […]
People, Etc.
At Ten Speed Press, Sara Golski has been promoted to editor and Emily Timberlake has been promoted to associate editor, both reporting to Julie Bennett. The Waxman Agency’s Holly Root is relocating to Los Angeles. She will open a west coast office for the agency, and will continue to develop her client list as well as expand the agency’s network of TV and film contacts. A Mississippi court judge has thrown out a lawsuit by Ablene Cooper alleging that Kathryn Stockett based a key character in her bestselling novel THE HELP on her. Cooper, the African-American maid for one of […]