Message from Derk Haank, Chairman, Elsevier Science, regardingHarcourtacquisition

[Ann Okerson <ann.okerson@yale.edu>]

Forwarded from reedelscustomers@lists.cc.utexas.edu

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 12 Jul 2001 11:48:26 +0200
From: "Haank, Derk (ELS)" <D.Haank@elsevier.nl>
To: "'reedelscustomers@lists.cc.utexas.edu'"
Subject: Message from Derk Haank, Chairman, Elsevier Science regarding 
Harcourt acquisition

Reed Elsevier's acquisition of the Harcourt publishing businesses has now
been approved by the competition authorities in the US and the UK.
 
At Elsevier Science we intend to ensure that this will mean improved
products and services and increased value for our customers.  We believe
that the two companies are an excellent match in terms of culture and
business.  The combined business will focus entirely on scientific,
technical and medical publishing, offering customers choice across our
portfolio. The products and people in the Harcourt scientific, technical
and medical publishing businesses reflect the Elsevier Science commitment
to quality and value.
 
The name of our combined business will be Elsevier Science.  We have
created two business divisions, both operating under the Elsevier Science
name:
 
* Science & Technology Division will serve customers in these fields and
add to our existing portfolio the journals, books and major reference
works published under the Academic Press imprint.
 
* Health Sciences Division will serve customers in the medical field and,
in addition to existing Elsevier Science products and imprints, such as
The Lancet and Excerpta Medica, will include the well-known imprints of
W.B. Saunders, Mosby and Churchill Livingstone, as well as MD Consult.
 
We are committed to investing in the development of quality electronic
products.  Our leading electronic platform, ScienceDirect, is evidence of
this.  We will continue these investments in the combined business.  The
first step is to create access through ScienceDirect to all the journal
titles coming from the Harcourt portfolio as soon as possible, enabling
customers to choose seamless access through one platform.  Elsevier
Science will also honour all existing contracts for IDEAL.
  
We are very excited to be able to use the great possibilities of
electronic publishing to the benefit of the academic community.  It is our
mission to make sure that soon all our material will be available at every
researcher's desktop 24 hours a day, with unlimited access.  To make that
possible we will not only continue our investments in new functionality,
but also in new business models to allow wider access.

The commitment we made two years ago to keeping print price increases to a
single digit figure for the complete package of our print journals,
incorporating the effects of currency fluctuations, growth in volume
output and inflation, will now apply to the entire extended portfolio.
This should result in lower price increases for Harcourt journals than in
the past and also below the industry average, in line with Elsevier
Science's policy.
 
Derk Haank
Chairman
Elsevier Science