Dow Jones has signed an agreement to acquire the news division of Vereinigte Wirtschaftsdienste (vwd), a provider of German-language financial newswires and business newsletters, for EUR9.8m.
In a simultaneous transaction, vwd's market-data terminal and services business is being bought by an investment group headed by Edmund Keferstein.
Dow Jones says it will keep vwd's 120 editorial staff, which are located in Eschborn, Frankfurt, Berlin, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Dusseldorf, Munich and Brussels. The news unit will be re-branded as Dow Jones-VWD News.
Current MD of vwd Michael Frank will become MD, Dow Jones Newswires Germany, and director of international business development. He will report to Michael Bergmeijer, VP of international sales and marketing for Dow Jones Newswires.
Dow Jones will pay EUR9.8m in cash for the news business. The net price of the transaction will be about EUR4.4m after netting out the Dow Jones EUR5.4m share of the proceeds from the sale of vwd's market-data terminal and services business.
On a pro-forma annualised basis, Dow Jones will pick up revenue of about EUR18m, EBITDA of EUR1.9m and operating income (after purchase accounting) of EUR0.5m, and give up its minority share of vwd's income of about EUR0.3m, which previously was recorded in equity earnings (EUR0.7m) and minority interest (EUR0.4 m) on its consolidated income statement.
Paul Ingrassia, president, Dow Jones Newswires, says: "Instead of a minority stake in a vertically integrated vwd, we will now own 100% of the leading real-time financial-news service in Europe's largest economy."
The transaction is expected to be completed within a month.