April 5, 2010 PUBLISHERS WEEKLY ACQUIRED BY FORMER PW PUBLISHER GEORGE SLOWIK, JR. Slowik Partners with Mediapolis for Acquisition New York, N.Y., April 2, 2010 -  New York City based PWxyz, LLC announced today that it, in partnership with Mediapolis, inc., has acquired Publishers Weekly, publishersweekly.com and Publishers Weekly Show Daily from Reed Business Information-US. The new company will retain all of Publishers Weekly editorial, art and advertising employees and will maintain its headquarters in New York City's publishing hub. Cevin Bryerman as publisher, and Jim Milliot and Michael Coffey as co-editors, will continue to lead the publication's management team. According to Slowik, PWxyz will leverage Publishers Weekly brand equity and talent pool to extend the franchise to a wider electronic and international footprint. "I am very excited to be back at Publishers Weekly as e-books hit their tipping point, workable translations become automated and as the Google book settlement is completed," said Slowik.  He added, "Publishers Weekly will benefit from a lithe operation that can properly report on and interpret the implications of this incredible evolution of the book business." PWxyz has partnered with Mediapolis, a New York City based web-engineering firm that will quickly migrate the PW site to its more robust platform.  They will invert the process by creating all content electronically and then have the print product/s and all electronic products, including syndication feeds and daily, weekly and monthly newsletters flow from it in multi-lingual iterations.  The upended production process will allow for optimal efficiency, speed-to-market and a better subscriber experience. Slowik previously ran Publishers Weekly in the late eighties and early nineties, and despite an economic collapse led the title to record profits.  Coincidentally the areas that led to its success -- international, electronic rights (CD-ROM at the time) and enhanced attention to reviews -- are all in play again. John Poulin, CEO of Reed Business Information-US said, "Given George's history with Publishers Weekly, we believe this will be a great match." About PWxyz, LLC PWxyz, LLC is a newly organized company led by President George W. Slowik, Jr. and created to acquire Publishers Weekly magazine, Publishers Weekly Show Daily, www.publishersweekly.com and all related assets. About Mediapolis Mediapolis www.mediapolis.com creates technology that simplifies the production of high profile, high performance Web sites.  Since 1994, Mediapolis has built more than 275 sites for clients like The New York Times, Johnson & Johnson, Volvo Cars, and Sony Music. About Reed Business Information-US Reed Business Information-US www.reedbusiness.com/us is a leading business-to-business information provider of publications and web sites, as well as custom publishing, directories and research.  Reed Business Information-US is part of Reed Elsevier (NYSE: RUK and ENL), a world leading provider of professional information and workflow solutions in the Science, Medical, Legal, Risk Management and Business sectors.

index

close