CEO Leaves AMS Bruce Myers is leaving his post as president and CEO at Advanced Marketing Services “immediately,” and is resigning his board post as well. An accounting advisor to the company in the wake of its accounting scandal in 2004, Myers joined AMS that April as chief operating and officer and moved up to CEO later that year. The company says in an announcement they expect to announce a replacement “shortly… who is well-known and highly regarded in the company’s industry. In the meantime, evp and co-founder Loren C. Paulsen is serving as interim president and CEO. Trade Soft […]
Lunch for Wednesday, May 3
Another Tough Quarter at Harlequin Figuring out Harlequin-parent Torstar’s first quarter results requires more complicated parsing of currency hedging, exchange rates, and accounting regulation changes than usual — which generally indicates the company is straining for ways to explain that business wasn’t as bad as it looks. Actual profit from book publishing was down $9.5 million (CA) from last year — though last year they made money from smart dollar hedging rather than smart publishing. “Underlying” book profits were flat. Actual book sales declined to $118 million, from $127 million a year ago. Nonetheless, CEO Robert Prichard declares, “At Harlequin, […]
Lunch for Tuesday, May 2
Tim, Out Don’t you hate it when you try to force a company to give up on a planned acquisition they worked hard on for eight months and sell one of their units to you instead, and they try to impose strict conditions on you? And then your primary backer “coincidentally” happens to pull their promised financing? That’s the world of Tim Waterstone, who continues his long losing streak of failed efforts to buy back the bookstore chain he founded. (Which is probably just as well — doesn’t Tim know that when you use private equity money for a purchase, […]
Lunch for Monday, May 1
Finally, It’s Chinski Long expected to succeed Jonathan Glusman, Eric Chinski has now officially been named as the new editor-in-chief at Farrar, Straus. He has been an executive editor there since 2003. Publisher Jonathan Galassi says in the announcement: “Eric is one of the most imaginative and talented editors I’ve known in my time in publishing. He is also a natural leader who is temperamentally empathetic – a quality much appreciated by both his authors and his colleagues. All of us at FSG look forward to working closely with him for many years to come.” On Friday, Publishing Trends reported […]
Lunch Weekly for Monday, May 1
Monday, May 1 Our Usual Reminder If for some reason this has reached you even though you are not a paying member of PublishersMarketplace, please visit the link below to join us all the time for complete deal reports and more. Click to register http://www.publishersmarketplace.com/register.shtml Deal Reports Just e-mail to deals@PublishersMarketplace if you aren’t using the online form linked below. Report a deal using the online form The Key As usual, the handy key to our Lunch deal categories. While all reports are always welcome, those that include a category will generally receive a higher listing when it comes time […]
Lunch for Friday, April 29
Graham to Granta and More Personnel News Canongate managing director David Graham will take over as managing director of Granta Publications this summer, overseeing the book and magazine units as well as Portobello Books (also backed by Granta owner Sigrid Rausing). Rausing comments: “We are thrilled that David is joining us. Together with Ian Jack, who is now Editor-in-Chief of Books as well as the magazine, he will oversee the return of fiction to the Granta list, alongside the impressive non-fiction list built up by George Miller and Sara Holloway. At Portobello he will free up Philip Gwyn Jones to […]