Keith Jones, the group CEO of Reed Business Information is retiring later this month, as the B2B publisher’s contraction nears its final stages for now.
UK CEO Mark Kelsey will add the group-level role to his job, reports Journalism.co.uk , which has this excerpt from Jones’ leaving email to staff…
“After a difficult period of trading, RBI has a new direction and a new sense of purpose, and this feels like the right time to step down and allow Mark Kelsey and the RBI management team to get on with delivering on their exciting growth plans.”
Anglo-Dutch owner Reed Elsevier (NYSE: RUK), in February 2008, announced its intention to sell RBI.
But, with the economic climate tightening investment capital, by December that year, it abandoned the sale.
That has left RBI in shrinkage mode. RBI U.S. has sold or closed titles worth around 45 percent of its revenue. UK sell-offs have been lesser and more piecemeal.