Bertelsmann reported results for the first six months of the year, including the last financial report for Random House Inc. as a standalone company, covering the period right up to the merger with Penguin. Sales were “slightly lower” than last year’s record first half, falling 32 million euros (or 3.4 percent) to 915 million euros for the period. Operating EBIT “soared” by 4 million euros (or 3.5 percent) to a mid-year record of 117 million euros. Among the major contributors were sales of “more than four million” English-language units of Dan Brown’s INFERNO in the first six weeks on sale, […]
Publishers
Hachette Has Softer Second Quarter But Remains Up for the Year
Lagardere reported first-half of the year results after the close of the market in France on Thursday. Sales at Lagardere Publishing were 495 euros in the second quarter — and 917 million euros for the formally reported first half, up 3.1 percent on a like-for-like basis, and 12 million euros higher on a topline basis from a year ago. (They say negative foreign exchange movements cost 15.5 million euros.) That means they gave up some ground up in the second quarter, after a strong first quarter that was 25 million euros ahead of the prior year. Earnings rose more, with […]
Even with Big Hits, Mondadori Slides In First Half
Earlier in August, Italy’s Mondadori Group reported results for the first half of the year. “There was a slowdown in the trade books market” that pushed Mondadori’s total book sales down 7.3 percent to €134 million, with EBITDA of €10.3 million (down almost 20 percent). Among their publishing lines, however, sales rose 2.6 percent at Edizioni Mondadori (thanks to 700,000 copies in print of Dan Brown’s INFERNO), and 8.2 percent at Piemme (thanks to Khaled Hosseini’s AND THE MOUNTAINS ECHOED.) The company says it maintained its market share, still leading the trade with 26 percent of all trade revenues. (They […]
People, Etc.
Amulet has revealed details on Jeff Kinney‘s forthcoming eighth Wimpy Kid book, HARD LUCK, sporting a lime green cover for its November 5 release. Kinney says, “As a writer, there’s something wickedly satisfying about putting Greg Heffley under duress, and in the eighth book, Greg suffers a multitude of indignities. But this time around he has a secret weapon against the slings and arrows of middle school.” Meryl Streep will narrate the audio version of Colm Toibin’s THE TESTAMENT OF MARY, for September release. Some day soon, now that HarperCollins comprises a more meaningful portion of the new foxless News Corp., […]
Houghton Files SEC Papers for $100 Million IPO
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt formally filed a preliminary prospectus with the SEC last Friday, preparing to offer shares to public worth up to $100 million. As reported earlier, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are the lead underwriters, joined by Citigroup, Credit Suisse and Wells Fargo. None of the proceeds will go to the company however; this offering is all returning some cash to HMH’s backers, and giving them a liquid public market to trade (and value) their shares. Houghton will not formally release second quarter 2013 results until later this month, on August 15 — though they essentially disclosed those results […]
Profits Rebound At Simon & Schuster As Sales Are Flat
Simon & Schuster reported flat sales of $189 million for the second quarter — which represents a bit of forward movement, after sales had declined modestly in each of the previous three quarters. As usual, parent company CBS commented that “continued growth in digital book sales was offset by lower print book sales.” OIBDA was $21 million, “back to normal” in comparison to last year’s $9 million, which reflected some of the settlement of the ebook pricing case, and helped “as the more profitable digital book sales continued to grow.” Total digital revenues (including audio) were 29 percent for the […]