It’s clear that “sources” with an interest in seeing McGraw-Hill Education sold off for top dollar are going to keep the media informed as the bidding process moves along. In an “exclusive” report Reuters reveals that Apollo Global Management (first identified in a mid-July WSJ story) is among those to “put in initial bids.” Not surprisingly, Bain Capital and Thomas H. Lee Partners–who were partners in the underbid for Thomson Learning (which then became Cengage)–are also named in the story. They may be the only private equity firms to have made money in the education space over the last decade […]
Archives for August 2012
Modest Sales Gain For S&S As Legal Settlement Reduces Q2 Profits
CBS reported second quarter earnings after the close of the market on Thursday, with Simon & Schuster recording sales of $189 million, up 3 percent (or $6 million) as compared to a year ago. The sales increase reflected “continued growth in digital book sales, partially offset by lower print book sales.” (Close observers–like us–will note this is a subtle variation on the line that CBS has repeated three times over the past year: “strong growth in the sale of more profitable digital content was offset by lower print book sales” is what they have said in the past.) OIBDA, however, declined sharply […]
Bookselling: Northshire Books May Add Second Location in Saratoga Springs; HMH Offering Refunds for Lehrer’s IMAGINE
Northshire Bookstore in Manchester, VT is seriously considering opening a second location in Saratoga Springs, NY. Owner Chris Morrow told the Saratogian the bookseller is “very excited about the prospect of coming to Saratoga,” but with plans still tentative, he said he was “he was not at liberty, yet, to discuss other locations under consideration.” The city appealed as a place for a second location for several reasons, Morrow explained, “including proximity to Skidmore College, Saratoga Performing Arts Center and the City Center” and that there “seems to be a well-educated, well-to-do populace that would be interested in what we […]
People
Dan Mallory will join William Morrow as vp, executive editor on October 8. He is currently publisher at Little Brown UK’s commercial imprint Sphere. The company uses the personnel memo to announce that they will add a digital-first publishing line focused on crime and thrillers which Mallory will spearhead, in addition to acquiring and editing books for Morrow. (He launched a similar digital-first line, The Crime Vault, in the UK.) At The Experiment, Jack Palmer has been promoted to publicity, marketing, and sales manager and Molly Cavanaugh moves up to assistant managing editor, while current managing editor Karen Giangreco will […]
Hachette UK Reduces Education Division
In the UK, Hachette is realigning its education businesses. The health sciences and higher education lines are being sold to Taylor & Francis, the Bookseller reports. CEO Tim Hely Hutchinson tells the magazine, “they were sub-scale and could not compete with the major, much larger, publishers in the area. After exploring a number of options, we decided that selling them to Taylor & Francis was the best outcome.” The consumer education line is being moved into Hodder & Stoughton. In accompanying personnel changes, Lis Tribe is being promoted to managing director of the reduced Hodder Education division and current ceo […]
People
Author, essayist, screenwriter, bon vivant, and public intellectual Gore Vidal, 86, died Tuesday from complications of pneumonia. His 25 novels included THE CITY AND THE PILLAR (1948), JULIAN (1964), and MYRA BRECKENRIDGE (1968), as well as a trilogy of crime novels written under the pseudonym Edgar Box, though he was more famous to younger generations for his bon mots and television appearances. His editor for over a decade Gerry Howard said in a brief statement: “Gore Vidal was the last surviving giant of a postwar crop of American literary giants. He was also that rare American writer who spoke not […]