FTSE 100 group Informa has unveiled a strategic overhaul that will see it separate its academic publishing business Taylor & Francis and raise £940mn in new equity to buy rival conferences group Clarion.
The transactions, including the £2.2bn acquisition of Clarion from private capital group Blackstone, will narrow Informa’s focus to its core live events and business operations.
Stephen Carter, who is one of the longest-serving FTSE chief executives after almost 13 years, has built Informa into a company with an £11bn market capitalisation by aggressively expanding its live-event operations in recent years.
Informa said it would look at all options for the future of the newly separated academic unit before coming to a decision on its future next year. Carter said Informa had already been approached by companies expressing interest in acquiring the business.
The decision to spin off Taylor & Francis was taken, he added, because “to grow that business, you really needed more focus”. Meanwhile, Informa was becoming a “pure-play” business events company, he said.
“We are unrecognisable from where we were as a company 15, 20 years ago,” he added.
Shares in Informa fell nearly 2 per cent in early trading before bouncing back and climbing 6 per cent by Tuesday afternoon.
The group has benefited from the surge in demand for in-person meetings and social events following the forced lockdowns of the pandemic, while expanding the range of services provided on the back of its many global conferences to build new revenue streams.
Buying Clarion gives Informa a new portfolio of more than 100 business-to-business brands, including the world’s largest consumer electronics event, IFA Berlin, the defence event DSEI and gaming conference ICE in Barcelona.
Informa said that the acquisition of Clarion from Blackstone would accelerate growth and enhance earnings per share from 2027.
Carter said that annual revenues at the group would exceed $6bn after the addition of Clarion, with the deal being funded through a mixture of acquisition financing and a £940mn equity placing.
The sale is a boon for Blackstone during a period in which many private equity groups have struggled to exit investments, hitting returns to their investors.
But despite difficulties in the private equity M&A market, activity in events businesses has been more robust. The Clarion sale is the latest deal in the sector after Providence and Searchlight in June sold global business events group Hyve to Hellman & Friedman for about $1.8bn.
The transactions reflect the boom in corporate events and business conferences since the end of the pandemic, with executives seeing the benefits of meeting in person again to strike deals and sales teams bringing together customers who often now work remotely.
Last year, Carter moved his residency from the UK to the UAE to run the business from one of the region’s fastest-growing regions. Although the FTSE 100 company makes less than 5 per cent of revenues from the UK, company executives have said that they were committed to the UK listing.