Ascential

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Ascential (formerly EMAP) was a British-headquartered global company, specialising in events, intelligence and advisory services for the marketing and financial technology industries. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange until it was acquired by Informa in October 2024.

History

Richard Winfrey purchased the Spalding Guardian in 1887 and later purchased the Lynn News and the Peterborough Advertiser; he also started the North Cambs Echo. He became a Liberal politician and campaigner for agricultural rights and the papers were used to promote his political views in and around Spalding, Boston, Sleaford and Peterborough. During World War II Winfrey's newspaper interests began to be passed over to his son, Richard Pattinson Winfrey (1902–1985). In 1947, under the direction of 'Pat' Winfrey, the family's newspaper titles were consolidated to form the East Midland Allied Press (EMAP): this was achieved by the merger of the Northamptonshire Printing and Publishing Company, the Peterborough Advertiser Company, the West Norfolk and King's Lynn Newspaper Company and commercial printing sections at Rushden, King's Lynn and Bury St Edmunds.<ref name=history>Template:Cite web</ref>

The magazine division was founded on a hunch when the company's printing presses lay dormant between printing issues of the local papers. The staff gambled that a weekly angling publication would be a hit; in 1953, Angling Times was born. This was soon joined by another weekly heavyweight when EMAP bought Motor Cycle News from its founder in 1956 for £100.<ref name=history/> EMAP grew significantly in the late 1970s under the guidance of the extremely successful partnership of Sir Robin Miller and David Arculus.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In 1992 and 1993, EMAP moved into trade magazines by acquiring titles from Maxwell Communication and Thomson.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In 1996, EMAP agreed to sell its 65 newspaper titles, including the 300-year-old Stamford Mercury, to Johnston Press for £111 million.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Scottish Radio Holdings was acquired by EMAP on 21 June 2005.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In 2006, EMAP sold its French division to Italy's Arnoldo Mondadori Editore.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> On 27 July 2007, EMAP announced that it was undertaking a review of the structure of the group in response to receiving a number of unsolicited proposals to purchase parts of the company.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> On 12 September 2007, EMAP announced that it had completed the disposal of its Australian consumer magazine division, EMAP Australia for approximately £38m to ACP Magazines.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> On 29 January 2008, EMAP completed the sale of its radio, television and consumer media businesses (EMAP Radio) to German company Bauer for £1.14bn.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The remainder of the company was taken over by Eden Bidco Ltd, a company incorporated for the purpose of the acquisition by its owners, the private equity investment group Apax and the Guardian Media Group in late March/early April 2008.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

In March 2012, the company announced that it would be renamed Top Right Group, and that its magazines, events and data businesses would be separated into three standalone companies. The EMAP name would continue to be used for the magazines operation, which at the time accounted for around 18 per cent of the group's turnover. The database business was renamed 4C Group, and the events unit was renamed I2i Events Group.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Then in October 2015 the company announced that the EMAP brand would be scrapped as all its titles move to digital-only format.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In February 2015, Top Right Group sold Media Business Insight (including Broadcast, Shots and Screen International) to Mobeus Equity Partners and Tenzing PE.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In December 2015, Top Right Group rebranded as Ascential.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The company was the subject of an £800m initial public offering in February 2016.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The Guardian Media Group sold off its shares of Ascential in 2016 and 2017.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In June 2017, Ascential sold heritage brands (business-to-business titles) to Metropolis International. The transaction included the rights to EMAP name (as EMAP Publishing Ltd).<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

In July 2024, Informa reached a deal to acquire Ascential for approximately £1.2 billion.<ref name="ft2407">Template:Cite news</ref> The court sanctioned the deal in October 2024, allowing the transaction to proceed to completion.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Acquisitions and sales

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2014

Money 20/20 - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

2015

Retail Net Group - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

2016

One Click Retail - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

2017

RWM - Sold<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Clavis Insight - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
MEED - Sold<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
11 heritage brands (EMAP Publishing) - Sold<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
MediaLink - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
HSJ - Sold<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

2018

Brand View - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
WARC - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Flywheel Digital - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Exhibitions - Sold<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

2020

Glenigan - Sold<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

2021

DeHavilland - Sold<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

OneSpace - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

MediaLink - Sold<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

2022

Intrepid - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Sellics - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

2023

Contagious - Acquired<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

2024

WGSN - Sold<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

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Operations

Ascential operates two informational service categories focused on businesses in the digital economy. The two areas are marketing and financial technology.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

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