Consulting and M&A Services
for Publishers And Information Providers
Assisting clients to develop strategies and implement programs to
maximize value.
Info Pub Advisors is the firm through which Edward Fitzelle offers management consulting, financial advisory, and
M&A specialty services to clients in magazine and book publishing, events businesses, information publishing and
online publishing.
The focus of the firm is to assist owners in building value through operating improvements and, when the time is
right, to realize value through a sale of the company or a merger.
Info Pub also provides other services such as buyer's representation, strategy consulting, management consulting,
valuation services and expert witness testimony.
Info Pub is currently engaged to sell a b-to-b magazine for sporting goods retailers, a print advertising network, a
three-title b-t-b and consumer magazine publisher, a women's special interest hobbyist magazine, and a custom
publisher.
Among its consulting clients are a leading online news service serving the commercial real estate industry, a bi-
weekly newspaper for architects and designers and a custom publisher serving large-scale marketers in
telecommunications and financial services. During the past year the firm completed four management consulting
assignments, assisted in the development of two launch plans for consumer magazines and completed valuations
for three clients.
Investment Banking Experience
Mr. Fitzelle was a Managing Director of the publishing industry investment bank AdMedia Partners, Inc. (API) for
eight years prior to opening Info Pub. Among the transactions that Fitzelle closed during his tenure at API are:
- The sale of a large professional journal publisher to Wolters Kluwer U.S. Corporation;
- The sale of a leading family-owned b-to-b magazine publisher to Reed Elsevier Business Information;
- The sale of two of Primedia’s special interest titles to strategic buyers;
- The sale of a Reed Elsevier directory division to a strategic buyer;
- The sale of a medical research business to Snyder Communications, Inc.;
- The sale of an industry leading trade show company to Primedia;
- The sale of a leading marketing data base business to The Dun Bradstreet Corporation;
Corporate Experience
Prior to joining API, Fitzelle held a number of executive positions at The McGraw-Hill Companies. He led strategic
planning, and acquisition and divestiture activities in both the Magazine and Book Divisions.
He played a key role on its Professional Publishing Group management team that improved Group performance
from sales of $200 million with ROS of 4% to sales of $300 million with ROS of 10%. Fitzelle was responsible for
all Group transactions among which were:
- The acquisition of a competitive medical book division from Maxwell Macmillan;
- A series of transactions to create an alliance between McGraw-Hill's Toronto-based book publishing
subsidiary and Les Editions de la Cheneliere, a Montreal competitor; - The divestiture of medical data base businesses to Medstat and HCIA;
- The divestiture of the medical book publishing assets of M-H’s French subsidiary to Blackwell’s;
- The purchase of an educational book distributor in Santiago, Chile to create a new international subsidiary;
- The acquisition of Tab Books a $25 million professional, reference and trade book publisher.
Mr. Fitzelle was also responsible for several divestitures including Chemical Week, American Machinist,
Engineering and Mining Journal, Coal Age, The Keystone Coal Industry Directory, International Management, and
Physicians Financial News. He also divested a management training business, an audiotape publisher and a clinical
trials business.
Other Experience
Mr. Fitzelle was recently engaged by the Conference Division of The Conference Board, the country’s leading
organizer of conferences and seminars for corporate executives. His assignment was to jump-start program
development and re-build the portfolio of events offered by the Division. By the end of the engagement he had
grown the number of events from 97 to 114, and the Division achieved a record level for profit contribution.
Mr. Fitzelle also served for 10 years as the U.S. Marketing Consultant to Severn House Books, a London, UK,
publisher of mid-list fiction and non-fiction books.
Editorial Management Experience
Early in his career, Fitzelle served as Managing Editor of Diversion, a travel and leisure magazine for physicians
(now owned by Hearst). At that time the magazine was owned by a private partnership. He was brought in to
organize the editorial process. His work enabled the owners to continue the rapid growth of the existing titles and
to add new titles to dramatically increase the size of the company. Prior to Diversion Fitzelle was Managing Editor
of Interior Design (now owned by Reed), where he reorganized the editorial production processes and increased
operating efficiency.
Education
Mr. Fitzelle earned an MBA degree from Columbia University. He is a graduate of Hamilton College.
Publications
Mr. Fitzelle has written for numerous publications, his writing on industry subjects includes the following:
Magazine Articles:
"The Art of Divestiture," Folio, July 15, 1999
"Placing a Value On Custom Publishers" Folio, July 15, 2000
White paper:
"Maximizing the Value of a Custom Publishing Company," The Custom Publishing Council, Spring 2003
