Re. Candover and Cinven-Springer purchase

[ann.okerson@yale.edu]

----- Forwarded message from Carol Hutchins <carol.hutchins@nyu.edu> --
Date: Fri, 01 Aug 2003 17:54:58 -0400
From: Carol Hutchins <carol.hutchins@nyu.edu>
Subject: from europa.eu.int (via google)
To: ann.okerson@yale.edu

Conditional clearance for acquisition of joint control by Candover and 
Cinven of German publisher BertelsmannSpringer

DN: IP/03/1130 Date: 29/07/2003
TXT: FR EN DE
PDF: FR EN DE
DOC: FR EN DE
IP/03/1130

Brussels, 29 July 2003

Conditional clearance for acquisition of joint control by Candover and 
Cinven of German publisher BertelsmannSpringer

The European Commission has authorised the acquisition of joint control 
by the investment companies Candover and Cinven of the German based 
academic and professional publisher BertelsmannSpringer. The 
transaction will lead to a combination of BertelsmannSpringer and the 
Dutch publisher Kluwer Academic Publishers acquired by Candover and 
Cinven in 2002. It will also combine BertelmannSpringer's business with 
the French professional publisher MediMedia, co-controlled by Cinven. 
The Commission found that the transaction would raise competition 
concerns in the market for professional medical publishing in France. 
Candover and Cinven successfully resolved these concerns by offering 
commitments.

Both BertelsmannSpringer and Kluwer Academic Publishers are active in 
the global market for academic publishing with a special focus on 
scientific, technical and medical (�STM�) journals, nearly exclusively 
published in English language. This market deals with the access to the 
latest developments in academic research. It exhibits some specific 
features: A main feature is the �must have� characteristic of certain 
journals.  Universities depend on the information provided in such 
journals and cannot afford to cancel subscriptions without loosing 
access to the most recent issues discussed in the academic community. A 
further feature of the market are considerable annual price rises for 
more than a decade.

The combined BertelsmannSpringer and Kluwer Academic Publishers will be 
the number two player in the market - lagging far behind the market 
leader Elsevier Science. Given the heterogeneity of journals and books 
published in different scientific disciplines and the heterogeneous 
nature of these books and journals even if published within a 
discipline, the Commission found no indications for a collective 
dominant position of Elsevier Science and the new entity resulting from 
the merger.

BertelsmannSpringer and MediMedia are both active in the French and 
German markets for professional medical publishing. These markets 
comprise newspapers, magazines, drug directories mainly addressed to 
doctors and financed by advertising. Whereas the transaction did not 
raise competition concerns for the German market, the Commission's 
investigation showed that the operation would lead to a dominant 
position on the French market. 

Candover and Cinven removed these competition concerns by offering to 
divest BertelsmannSpringer's French business in the market for 
professional medical publishing, known under the name �Groupe Impact 
M�dicine�.

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