Centaur acquires Profile in £8m deal

Business publisher Centaur has acquired the digital information company Profile, owner of Foresight News and Red Pages, for £8m.

Profile provides forward planning and contact information to media, PR and marketing professionals and its revenues are derived exclusively from subscriptions.

The company was founded in 1988 as a print directory business by Robert Barclay. In 2011 it had revenues of £3.1m and a 32 per cent profit margin.

The management team will be staying with the business, which derives most of its revenues from the UK but has now launched three of its services in the USA.

It will become part of Centaur’s business information division alongside digital information businesses Perfect Information and VBR, and will collaborate with Centaur’s existing brands Marketing Week and Creative Review.

Other brands within Profile include Fashion Monitor, Entertainment News and Year Ahead.

Centaur chief executive Geoff Wilmot said:

Profile is a good fit with our core strategic objectives of growing digital subscription revenues in our core markets and expanding our international capabilities.

We will accelerate Profile’s growth by: offering an exceptional route to market through our leading brands Marketing Week and Creative Review; the application of the successful Headline Group model to vertical markets served by Profile; and by leverage of Profile’s technology and business model in other parts of the Group.

The new revolving credit facility will fund this acquisition and provides us with the necessary resources to support our acquisitions programme.

Barclay said:

I am delighted that Profile has found a new home with Centaur, who are well placed to build on and develop the work carried out by the management team in the last few years. I wish Centaur and Profile every success for the future in taking the company on to a new level.

Centaur has also announced a £40m four-year revolving credit facility in order to fund its acquisition programme.
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