Following mediation by the Southern District’s US Bankruptcy Court, bankrupt Cengage says they have “reached an agreement with the company’s major financial stakeholders and creditors” to emerge from Chapter 11 once approved by the Court. As planned all along, more than $4 billion of their big debt load of $5.8 billion will go away (which still leaves them carrying substantial ongoing debt), and the company has lined up exit financing of between $1.5 billion and $1.75 billion, plus a new revolving credit line of about $250 million. The company hopes to have their plan confirmed by the court in March. […]
Finance
Corporate: Little Brown UK Buys Constable & Robinson; Simon & Schuster Launches Business Book Site
Little Brown UK has purchased Constable & Robinson, which will continue to operate as its own entity under managing director Pete Duncan, who will report to David Shelley. Nova Jayne Robinson indicates to the Bookseller that the conversations began some time last year, before the death of previous chairman Nick Robinson in September. “Nick and I shared the view that we could not imagine a better home.” C&R had been a member of the UK’s Independent Alliance, and they have been the UK distributor for Skyhorse as well as New Harbinger and New Holland. Simon & Schuster has launched 250 Words, […]
Haights Cross Sells Recorded Books
Haights Cross Communications has sold Recorded Books to private equity fund Wasserstein & Co., with Northwestern Mutual and Lexington Partners also contributing investment capital, and financing from BNP Paribas. The company’s primary market is unabridged audiobooks for libraries, schools and the retail market, but they also distribute 100,000 ebooks through their One-Click Digital Platform. Recorded Books ceo Rich Freese says in the announcement, “This strategic partnership provides us with the resources to further broaden our content offerings and services for customers, and accelerate our growth into additional global markets.” HCC used to report publicly until they filed, and emerged from, a […]
MacAdam/Cage Files for Chapter 7 Bankruptcy
Years of financial woes and the death last April of founder David Poindexter culminated in San Francisco-based publisher MacAdam/Cage filing voluntarily for Chapter 7 bankruptcy earlier this month, after failing to find a buyer since fall 2012. The 140-page filing, agreed upon by the Poindexter estate trustee Emeigh Poindexter on December 20 and filed in Northern California bankruptcy court on January 17, lists nearly $1.4 million in liabilities from unsecured creditors (along with an additional $64,000 from secured creditors) against approximately $130,000 in assets, the vast majority of which is book inventory stored at a space operated by Publishers Storage […]
Context: Looking Across Amazon, Google Play, iTunes and More
Most publishing-focused media is looking solely at Amazon’s fourth quarter earnings report from yesterday, but Google also reported earnings Thursday evening. The search giant’s sales and profits both rose 17 percent. Their sales are smaller than Amazon’s (about $17 billion, versus $25.5 billion) — but they had profits of over $4 billion (which is more than Amazon’s lifetime earnings). More importantly, with Google pushing their consolidated Play store and Apple continuing to grow iTunes sales, it’s time (long past time, actually) for us all to be looking across the digital media competitors. Amazon‘s total “media” sales for the year were […]
Bienstock Sold to UTA; Paradigm In Music Joint Venture
Consolidation of Hollywood agencies is continuing, with UTA announcing on Wednesday it is acquiring N.S. Bienstock, which specializes in representing hundreds of TV news personalities and producers. Co-presidents of Bienstock Richard Liebner and his wife Carol Cooper will remain in charge of the unit. Terms of the acquisition were not announced, but the LAT reports that UTA financed the deal itself rather than turning to an outside partner (in contract to WME and CAA, both of which have partnered with major private equity firms to finance their expansions). Separately, the LAT notes that another talent agency, Paradigm, announced Monday it […]