M&A
The
Dealmaker
Steve Monnington of Mayfield Media
Strategies runs the rule over the latest
global exhibition deals
M
edia 10 first had the idea
for the launch of Design
Shanghai in 2012. This was its
first launch in China and it didn’t
even have an office at the time.
I remember visiting the
first edition, which was totally
rammed with visitors, and it was
clear that the company had a big
success on its hands. The sister
show in Beijing launched last year
and now both events have been
sold to Clarion.
This represents Media 10’s first
disposal in its history and it has
definitely made it count. Some
press reports put the multiple
at around 13.5x but the price is
thought to be a little bit north of
£30m which would represent a
multiple of around 10.5x historic
EBIT. This is still high for what
is effectively a single product,
however multiples are high in
China and the risks normally
associated with the acquisition of
local businesses are not present
here. It will be interesting to see
if Media 10 deploys its new-
found capital in making further
acquisitions of its own.
GL events continues to
make inroads into the China
exhibition sector. Its third deal
this year sees it acquire 60 per
cent of Interwine, the specialist
exhibition for the wine and
spirits sector in southern China,
10 — August
held twice a year in Guangzhou,
adding to the earlier acquisitions
of CIEC Union (home décor)
and Fashion Source (fashion
fabrics). GL runs around 10
regional wine and gastronomy
fairs around France but this is its
first foray into the wine sector
in China. Interwine focuses
on international wines for the
China market so GL’s presence
in the sector in France can only
boost international exhibitor
participation.
More non-core asset disposals,
this time from Reed Business
Information. DVV Media
International is acquiring
Reed’s aviation publishing
and conference portfolio. The
business, currently part of
Cirium, a data and analytics
business for the wider travel
industry, mainly consists of
information products and
publishing but also includes a
number of conferences such
as Aerospace Big Data and
Airlines 2050. DVV, which
already publishes Air Cargo
News, is owned by German
publisher Rheinische Post and
is based in the UK, run by Andy
Salter who is ex-Reed. DVV has
recently acquired several other
publications from Reed as well
as Centaur’s human resource
exhibition division.
The industry is waiting to
see whether Easyfairs will
become the next big M&A play.
In the meantime it’s business
as usual with the acquisition of
London-based Aesthetics Media,
organiser of ACE – the Aesthetics
Conference and Exhibition – held
at the Business Design Centre.
Easyfairs acquired CCR (Clinical,
Cosmetic, Regenerative) Expo in
2016 from Peter Jones’ Nineteen
Group.
The International Society for
Optical Engineering (SPIE),
based in Washington, has agreed
to acquire UK organiser Xmark
Media. Xmark runs several
photonics events including
Photonex Europe and Vacuum
Expo at the Ricoh Arena,
Coventry. SPIE is the leading
global organiser of optics and
photonics events including
Photonics West in San Francisco
as well as several related
conferences in Germany, France
and China.
Finally, I am indebted to
Keith Harris for bringing my
attention to the acquisition of the
Peterborough Festival of Antiques
(PFA) by International Antiques
and Collectors Fairs (IACF). The
PFA, which runs twice a year
at the East of England Event
Centre and has more than 2,000
stallholders at each show joins a
portfolio of more than 30 events
run annually by IACF.