Lezen Acquisition, an investment group led by Michael Lynton and his sister Lily Lynton, has bought Arcadia Publishing in the first of what they indicate will be a series of book publishing acquisitions. Former Perseus Books Group ceo David Steinberger is leading the new company as ceo, and Michael Lynton is nonexecutive chairman. “We intend to […]
M&A
Harper Acquires AMACOM
Harper Collins announced it has acquired the trade book assets of AMACOM from the American Management Association International. That means they bought the list, without the accompanying infrastructure. Their 600-title catalog will be run as a sub-imprint of the recently launched Harper Collins Leadership line, based in Nashville. HCL publisher Jeff James will oversee AMACOM […]
Waterstones Negotiating Sale to Elliott Advisors
Elliott Advisors, the UK branch of Paul Singer’s hedge fund Elliott Management, has been given “a short period of exclusivity within which to conclude negotiations” to purchase UK bookselling chain Waterstones, Sky News reported, citing a single source. The report has a measure of credibility since, as we have been writing all along, “one insider suggested […]
Penguin Random House Buys Rodale Books
Penguin Random House announced Tuesday it has purchased the trade-book publishing assets of Rodale Books from Hearst — the new owners of Rodale — and will “take over the publication of its frontlist and backlist titles effective immediately.” Longtime distributor for Rodale Books Macmillan will continue to sell and distribute the titles for the time […]
2017: The Year In Agency Mergers and Moves
Supplementing yesterday’s The Year In Mergers, Acquisitions and Finance, this year saw a number of literary agency mergers — along with some significant movement by well-known agents, and even a few marquee authors. So here is a round-up. Many of the year’s notable mergers and acquisitions among literary agencies, as well as new agency launches, […]
2017: The Year In Mergers, Acquisitions and Finance
Anyone who thinks it was a quiet year for publishing mergers, acquisitions and finance doesn’t understand what happened very well. It was in fact both an active and fascinating year. First and foremost, 2017 saw one of the biggest trade publishing deals ever. We’re talking about the transaction hiding in plain sight, in which Bertelsmann […]