Reed Elsevier To Offload Trade Magazines

LONDON/AMSTERDAM, February
22: Reed Elsevier has announced its intention to sell off its B2B magazine
publishing business, which includes some 400 titles, including Variety.

Reed announced the move
yesterday following its acquisition of ChoicePoint, a provider of consumer
insurance information, for $4.1 billion. Reed Elsevier’s CEO, Sir Crispin
Davis, said of the decision: “RBI is a well-managed high quality business as
evidenced by the success of its online growth and the control of costs. Its
advertising revenue model and the inherent cyclicality fit less well, however,
with the subscription-based information and workflow solutions focus of Reed
Elsevier’s strategy.”

Reed Business
Information’s entertainment industry assets include Multichannel News, Broadcasting & Cable, Video Business and Television Asia. Reed Elsevier also operates Reed Exhibitions with
its RBI business, but that entity, which operates MIPTV and MIPCOM, among
numerous other trade shows, will not be sold.

Possible buyers for the
business, said to be worth about $2 billion, include Apax Partners. “The market
is strong for business-to-business companies,” Reed Phillips, a managing
partner of the media investment bank DeSilva & Phillips, told the New
York Times.

—By Mansha Daswani