Could 2007′s Real Publishing Story be Private Equity?

Okay, so the Judith Regan scandale is making headlines and fueling gossip but when it comes right down to it, says one publishing executive, her firing came down to “the powers that be finally running a profit and loss sheet and found that her operation – which is very expensive – wasn’t making them near enough (or possibly, was close to losing money recently) to offset the PR hits she regularly generated. It’s a money business and, especially at her level, if she was making them real money recently, she’d still be bullet-proof.”

And when publishing companies don’t make money, measures must be taken to turn them around. Which is why I’m inclined to agree with CNNMoney.com editor at large Paul La Monica, who floats the idea that private equity firms will start scooping up publishing houses like they have with other media companies (Univision, Clear Channel and Reader’s Digest to name a few) because they could be attracted to the steady streams of cash that book publishers generate. In fact, that’s already begun, as Houghton Mifflin was owned by a consortium of private equity partners (until they sold to Riverdeep a few weeks ago) and Thomas Nelson recently went private, too.

“If you look at the big media companies, they are all going through a reevaluation of the conglomerate model. It may not make as much sense to own everything,” said Glover Lawrence, co-founder of McNamee Lawrence & Co, an investment bank based in Boston. “Book publishers are generally very cash flow predictable so they make ideal targets for private equity buyers.” Simon & Schuster may be a good bet, and as I said last week, don’t be surprised if Random House is on the block, too. But HarperCollins is far less of a bet, said Reed Phillips, managing partner with DeSilva & Phillips. “Now that they’ve dismissed Regan, their view probably would be problem solved. I don’t think they would necessarily believe it would now be time to sell HarperCollins.”

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