Reed acquires BuyerZone.com; sells Canadian Trade Shows

Business Publisher, Dec 22, 2006

Reed Business Information (RBI; New York), a unit of Reed Elsevier, has agreed to acquire BuyerZone.com (Waltham, MA), an online lead generation company. No terms of the deal, expected to close at the beginning of the new year, were given. Reed was represented by The Jordan, Edmiston Group (New York).

BuyerZone is an online B2B marketplace that links prospective buyers to qualified suppliers of more than 125 business products and service categories, including office and industrial equipment, telecommunications, technology, software services, human resources, financial products and retail services. Reed said that BuyerZone has facilitated more than $5 billion worth of transactions since 2004.

Reed also said that the purchase will accelerate RBI's online editorial and marketing growth across numerous industry sectors, while BuyerZone will benefit from RBI's portfolio of web sites, magazines and e-mail marketing businesses.

Also, Reed Exhibitions (Norwalk, CT) has sold its Canadian industrial and manufacturing tradeshow portfolio, to The Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME; Dearborn, MI) and Vance Publishing Corp. (Lincolnshire, IL), as the final divestiture in its alignment of its business operations in North America. Earlier this year, Reed Exhibitions sold its U.S. manufacturing and industrial tradeshow portfolio, including nine shows to Canon Communications (Los Angeles, CA) in May.

SNE has purchased Plant Maintenance & Design Engineering, Western Manufacturing Technology Show, Canadian Manufacturing Technology Show, Advanced Manufacturing Expo, Montreal Manufacturing Technology, Southwest Ontario Industrial Show, and Canadian Manufacturing Week. Vance Publishing has acquired Woodworking Machinery & Supply Expo and SIBO, an industrial woodworking show. Related Vance products include the magazines "Wood & Wood Products" and "Custom Woodworking Business," both produced monthly, and "Closets," published six times a year. Related SME assets include the Westec and Eastec manufacturing and metalworking events, FabTech International and the AWS Welding Show.