About:
Santillana is a textbook and general-interest publishing group in Spain and Latin America with an international presence in 22 countries. Since March 2000, Santillana has been part of PRISA, which provides education, news and information, and entertainment as the largest media group in the Spanish and Portuguese-speaking markets.
Key company developments in 2011 & 1st half year 2012
Financial:
Despite the difficult macroeconomic situation in Spain and Portugal, the Prisa Group announced a “robust operating performance in 2011.” While advertising and general publishing (Ediciones Generales) “performed weakly," educational publishing was up to 720 million EUR from 642 million EUR in 2010. This was related to a 12% growth in Latin America, mainly in Brazil, which saw an increase of 24.1%. A growth of 8.6% in Spain was driven by education campaigns. Educational revenue contributed 26.4% of PRISA’s earnings. Adjusted EBITDA totaled 173.70 million EUR, 4.4% above last year’s result.
Ownership, mergers & acquisition, internal organization:
In response to debt problems, Prisa restructured its corproate businesses and signed a refinancing agreement that extends loan maturity to 2014 - 15. Cost-cutting efforts include a 7% reduction of management salary and the disposal of a 25% interest of Santillana to the private equity fund DLJ South America for approximately $370 million USD, which was completed in April 2010.
International:
Prisa increased its presence in the Latin American markets, which has "partly mitigated the fall in the advertising markets of Spain and Portugal," declared Prisa chairman and CEO Juan Luis Cebriá. "The international revenues of PRISA account already for more than 32% of the total.”
Digital:
Santillana came out strong with a digital initiative in 2010, digitizing every book it owns the rights to, and moving to launch print and e-books simultaneously. According to David Naggar from Amazon, Santillana sold more e-books via Kindle than through any other channel in Spain and Latin America. For each e-book that is sold in Spain, two Kindle ebooks are sold in the US. Santillana expected the ratio to be 1:15.
Bestselling authors & titles:
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Key points for analysis & conclusions:
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Earlier developments:
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Note: Figures are based on sales generated in calendar 2011 or—for corporations with a fiscal year—from fiscal 2011. Data are from publicly available sources and include sales of books, journals, and digital products. Because publishing data were unavailable, Pannini and Disney/Hyperion are excluded from the rankings. The listing and publisher profiles were compiled by international publishing consultant Rudiger Wischenbart under the aegis of Livres Hebdo.
