| overview
holdings
landmarks
related:
Financial
Times
Les Echos
Recoletos
|
landmarks
This chronology is indicative only. It covers -
Context is provided by the broader communications and
media timeline on this site.
antecedents
1724
Longman publishing founded
1725 Thomas Longman publishes first book typeset by Benjamin
Franklin
1844 S Pearson founds civil engineering business
1856 Pearson provides railway construction services in
UK
1863 Pearson provides canal and railway construction services
in Egypt, Canada and Mexico
1865 Frederick Warne leaves Routledge,
forms Frederick Warne & Co
1889 S. Pearson & Son building Hudson tunnel in New York;
railways in Spain, Mexico, Colombia and China; dams and
canals in Mexico and docks in Egypt and Canada
1889 Scott Foresman publishing founded
beginnings
1893 Westminster Gazette launched (merged
with Daily News in 1928)
1901 launch of Daily Express
1901 Pearson enters Mexican oil business, establishes
Mexican Eagle oil extraction, refining and shipping operation
1903 Joseph Rowntree Social Service Trust buys three County
Durham newspapers, later forms Westminster Press
1913 Prentice Hall publishing founded
1919 William Berry acquires
Financial Times and St Clements Press
diversification
1919 Pearson establishes Whitehall Trust corporate finance
and investment house
1920 Pearson buys Westminister Press and other UK provincial
newspapers such as the Brighton Evening Argus and
The Oxford Mail
1938 Pearson's Mexican Eagle nationalised
1942 Addison-Wesley founded
1947 Longman becomes public company
1946 Penguin Australia founded
1952 Pearson invests in British Overseas Airways
absorbs FT and Penguin
1957 gains control of Financial Times (FT)
1959 South African Financial Mail launched by
South African Associated Newspapers (SAAN)
(40%) and UK Financial Times (50%)
1959 Pearson stake in Acton Bolt Ltd sold to GKN
1959 stake in Saunders-Roe sold to Westland Aircraft Company
1960 Athens Piraeus Electricity Company interests sold
1961 Penguin Books goes public
1963 Pearson takes controlling stake in Chateau Latour
winery
1963 Beytout family buys Les Echos
group from Servan-Schreiber family
1968 Pearson gains control of Longman publishers
1969 Pearson goes public
1970 Addison-Wesley buys US science publisher W.A. Benjamin
1971 Pearson gains control of Penguin books
1972 Pearson merges Royal Doulton ceramics group with
Allied English Potteries
1973 Prentice Hall buys Appleton-Century-Crofts
1974 SAAN buys Financial Times
stake for R180,000
1975 Viking merges with Penguin
1977 Addison-Wesley and Cummings merge
1978 Pearson buys waxworks and theme park operator Madame
Tussauds
1979 buys controlling interest in Camco Inc
1980 buys high technology businesses of Fairey Industries
Ltd
1982 sells Doulton Glass Industries
1983 Penguin buys Frederick Warne & Co for £6.1m
1985 Scott Foresman bought by Time
1985 Penguin buys Hamish Hamilton, Michael Joseph, Sphere
Books, Rainbird Publishing Group and TBD Book Service
from Thomson
1986 Pearson takes stake in British Satellite Broadcasting
(BSBH) with Granada and Seydoux-controlled
Chargeurs
1986 sells engineering interests (inc Fairey operations)
1987 Murdoch pays £250m for
14.9% stake in Pearson (subsequently sold)
1988 Pearson buys Addison-Wesley
1988 buys 35% stake in Recoletos
1988 buys 67% of Les Echos
group
1989 sells Whitehall Petroleum
1989 buys remainder of Les Echos
1990 Addison-Wesley buys Cuisenaire Company
1990 BSkyB formed through merger of Murdoch's
Sky Television and British Satellite Broadcasting (in
which Pearson, Seydoux-controlled
Chargeurs and Granada had stakes)
churn
1991 Pearson sells 22% Elsevier
stake for £313m; Elsevier sells 8% stake in Pearson
1992 buys Ventura
1993 Pearson buys UK Thames Television
1993 buys Extel Financial for £73.5m
1993 Pearson spins off Royal Doulton into a separate company
1993 establishes UK News as joint venture with DMG
subsidiary Northcliffe newspapers
1994 buys Software Toolworks/Mindscape (est 1984) for
US$462m
1994 Simon & Schuster buy US Macmillan Publishing after
Maxwell collapse
1994 BSkyB floated with value of £4.5bn
1995 Addison-Wesley merges with Longman Publishing to
create Addison Wesley Longman
1995 Economist buys Journal
of Commerce and subsidiaries from Knight
Ridder for US$115m
1995 Pearson buys Grundy Worldwide
1995 sells 14.8% stake in Yorkshire-Tyne Tees Television
to MAI for £41.2m
1995 buys Troll Communications, sold in 1997
1996 Pearson sells Westminster Press to Newsquest (later
acquired by Gannett) for £305m
1996 sells stake in First Oxfordshire Radio
1996 sells Kentish Mercury newspaper chain to Trinity
1996 sells 50% stake in UK News
1996 Pearson buys Putnam Berkley publishing group from
Seagram for US$350m and HarperCollins
US education interests from News
for US$580m
1996 Penguin takes 51% stake in Rough Guides
1997 sells Churchill Livingstone medical books for US$92m
1997 Pearson buys US producer All American Communications
1997 buys stake in UK commercial TV broadcaster Channel
5
1997 buys Resource Data International for US$25m
1997 buys Putnam Berkley for US$336m
1997 buys 50% of BDFM (Business Day, Financial
Mail and African Business Channel) from TML
1998 Pearson buys Viacom's Simon
& Schuster education, business & professional and reference
divisions for £2.9bn
1998 Pearson buys illustrated book publisher Dorling Kindersley
for US$466m
concentration
1998 Pearson sells M Tussaud's for $528m
1998 Pearson sells Mindscape games arm for US$138m after
US$405m loss
1998 sells Macmillan General Reference USA to IDG
for £52m
1998 sells Macmillan Library Reference USA to Thomson
for £53m
1998 sells Westminster Press to Newsquest Media Group
(later acquired by Gannett)
for £298m
1998 sells Capitol Publishing to Kluwer
for US$20m
1998 Pearson sells stake in Lazard banking houses for
£436m
1998 sells Register Group to EMAP for £9m
1999 Pearson sells medical publisher Appleton & Lange
to McGraw-Hill for US$46m
1999 Pearson sells law and tax publishing operations to
Thomson for £70m and Master
Data Center to Information Holdings for US$33m
1999 Pearson buys E Source for £11m
1999 Pearson sells Jossey-Bass to John Wiley
for US$82m
1999 sells Extel's research products division and the
Extel name to Primark of the US for £94m
2000 Pearson merges Pearson TV production holdings with
Bertelsmann-controlled RTL
Group
2000 sells 50% holding in AFX News to Agence France Presse
2000 launches Financial Times Deutschland with
Gruner & Jahr
2000 stake in Recoletos reduced to 79% when Recoletos
lists on Madrid exchange
2000 Pearson sells stake in Murdoch-controlled
UK statellite broadcaster BSkyB to Vivendi
for around £305m
2000 forms Pearson Broadband (programming)
2000 Pearson buys US National Computer Systems educational
services group for £1.7bn
2001 sells 22% stake in RTL to Bertelsmann
2003 buys S&P ComStock real-time information service
from McGraw-Hill for US$115m
2003 Financial Times Asian edition launched
2003 FT buys 13.85% of Indian Business Standard
(2nd largest financial paper) for US$3m
2003 Penguin Television (programming) founded
2004 spanish telecoms operator Telefonica
sells its 5% stake in Pearson for £236m
2004 Pearson announces agreement to sell stake in Recoletos
2005 Recoletos launches free metro Que! in 12
Spanish cities
2006 Pearson buys US professional examination agency Promissor
for US$42m from Houghton Mifflin
2006 pays £101m for online corporate finance news
service Mergermarket (est 2000)
2006 sells call centre and application processor Pearson
Government Solutions (PGS) to Veritas private equity group
for US$600m
2007 buys Harcourt Education International and Harcourt
Assessment from Reed Elsevier for US$950m
2007 agrees to buy eCollege.com (est 1996) for US$538m
2007 LVMH agrees to pay €240m for Les
Echos group
2007 Financial Times buys online recruitment specialist
Exec-Appointments
2008 Financial Times buys fund management news site Money-Media.com
(est 1996).
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