Informa and UBM rekindle merger talks to create £9bn trade show giant

Black Hat
UBM runs Black Hat, an annual gathering of computer hackers in Las Vegas Credit: UBM

Nearly a decade after a merger attempt collapsed, the trade show organisers Informa and UBM are again in talks about a combination, investors were told this evening.

The pair were forced to reveal their rekindled romance at the end of trading on the stock exchange, after rumours filtered through the market during the day and drove 5.2pc increase in UBM’s shares.

This time the suggested deal is a cash and shares Informa takeover of UBM to create the world’s largest business events company. If successful, Informa will overtake Relx and bring together industry jamborees such as its own World of Concrete with the likes of Black Hat, an annual gathering of computer hackers in Las Vegas.

The two companies have a combined stock market value of more than £9bn and overall revenues of £2.2bn, and run exhibitions all over the world across a multitude of industries.

Informa’s ambition represents a power shift compared with 2008, when the pair, then with a combined value of only £3bn, attempted to engineer a nil-premium merger of equals. Speculation about a deal has followed them since.

David Lloyd George
UBM was founded as a newspaper publisher at the end of the First World War by David Lloyd George

In the meantime UBM, founded as a newspaper publisher at the end of the First World War by David Lloyd George, has sold off PR Newswire to focus on events and associated business information. Trade magazines including The Publican and Property Week have also been offloaded and it sold its last title, Building, only last week.

UBM still retains some legacy of its past as a media owner, however, including a 20pc stake in the television news producer ITN from its time as an ITV franchisee in the Nineties.

Informa, meanwhile, remains a significant academic publisher and business information provider, although under chief executive Stephen Carter has made expanding its events operation its main growth strategy. It has made a string of acquisitions, including in 2016 the £1.2bn takeover of Penton, an Ohio-based events organiser and publisher of trade magazines including Aviation Week.

The sector has been consolidating rapidly as major players seek scale and diversity of brands and territories to shield them from industry and economic shifts. Penton fell prey to Informa two years after losing out to UBM in a bidding war over Advanstar, another trade show operator and business information provider.

Under takeover rules Informa has 28 days to make a firm offer to bring all the assets together. The companies’ last attempt to merge was complicated by interest from private equity bidders, who remain active in the events and business information markets.

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