Hachette Near Deal to Buy Perseus Books

Hachette Book Group is near a deal to buy one of the biggest independent U.S. publishers, Perseus Books Group, beefing up its market share even as it is enmeshed in a bitter dispute with Amazon.com, said people familiar with the situation.

Perseus, owned by private-equity firm Perseus LLC, houses about a dozen imprints, including Basic Books, Da Capo Press and PublicAffairs. The imprints publish in such areas as popular culture, science and history, with such titles as Samantha Power's "A Problem From Hell: America and the Age of Genocide," which won the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for general nonfiction. The publisher, like its private equity owner, was founded by leveraged buyout pioneer Frank Pearl, who died in 2012.

For Hachette, a unit of Lagardère SCA, the deal promises to boost its nonfiction offerings. Hachette is largely known for publishing such fiction writers as James Patterson, Michael Connelly, and David Baldacci. It would be the second acquisition struck by Hachette in the past year that has beefed up its nonfiction offerings, including its purchase of most of the adult Hyperion imprint from Walt Disney Co.

Hachette generated about 475 million euros ($646 million) in the U.S. in 2013, according to a recent investor day presentation that Lagardère made in Paris. Perseus produces between $90 million and $100 million in publishing revenue, a person familiar with the firm's finances said.

The deal is expected to include Perseus's client-services businesses, through which Perseus distributes books for others, although Hachette is expected to sell that business to Ingram Content Group, a unit of Ingram Industries Inc. Perseus generates about $300 million in distribution sales volume on behalf of more than 350 publisher clients, of which it takes a percentage.

Word of the pending deal comes as Hachette and Amazon are engaged in a bitter dispute over terms under which Amazon sells Hachette e-books. Amazon, which seeks to improve its cut of e-book prices, has blocked its customers from preordering upcoming Hachette titles and has delayed shipments of existing titles.

On Tuesday, consumers couldn't preorder a copy of Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child's upcoming novel, "The Lost Island," which Hachette's Grand Central Publishing imprint is publishing Aug. 5. By comparison, Barnes & Noble Inc.'s website is accepting preorders on the title, where the hardcover edition is priced at $17.55, a 35% discount, and the digital book is priced at $12.99.

Write to Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg at [e-mail]

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