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Reed Elsevier Plc
Type	Public (LSE: REL,Euronext: REN,NYSE: ENL, NYSE: RUK)
Founded	Merger of Elsevier and Reed International PLC in 1993
Headquarters	London and Amsterdam
Key people	CEO: Sir Crispin Davis Chairman: Jan Hommen
Industry	Publishing (science & medical, legal, education and business)
Revenue	£5,398 million (2006)
Operating income	£1,210 million (2006)
Net income	£623 million (2006)
Employees	36,000
Subsidiaries	Elsevier LexisNexis Harcourt Education Reed Business Information
Website	www.reedelsevier.com

Reed Elsevier (Euronext: REN, LSE: REL, NYSE: ENL, NYSE: RUK) is a leading global publisher and information provider. Reed Elsevier came into being in January 1993 as the result of a merger between Reed International, a British trade book and magazine publisher, and the Dutch science publisher Elsevier NV.

Contents 1 History 1.1 Reed International 1.2 Elsevier NV 2 Company divisions 3 Key products 4 Pricing issues 5 Arms dealing 6 Notes 7 External links

In 1894, Albert E. Reed established a newsprint manufacture at Tovil Mill near Maidstone, Kent. In 1903, Albert E Reed & Co was registered as a public company. In 1970, the company name was changed to Reed International Limited. The company originally grew by merging with other publishers and produced high quality trade journals as IPC Business Press Ltd and womens and other consumer magasines as IPC magazines Ltd. For a time the company published The Daily Mirror. The original family owners the Reeds were Methodists and encouraged good working conditions for their staff in the then dangerous print trade. They became known also for paying their staff well, and avoiding casual labour practices. The company however in modern times took full advantage of changing attitudes in the 1980s and was associated in job cutting exercises throughout its magazine empire, following union de-recognition in the 1990s (union recognition has since been regained in several business units).

In 1880, Jacobus George Robbers started a publishing company called NV Uitgeversmaatschappij Elsevier (Elsevier Publishing Company NV) to publish literary classics and the encyclopedia Winkler Prins. Robbers named the company after the old Dutch printers family Elsevier, which, for example, had published the works of Erasmus in 1587. Elsevier NV originally was based in Rotterdam but moved to Amsterdam in the late 1880s.

Up to the 1930s, Elsevier remained a small family-owned publisher, with no more than ten employees. When English overtook German as the language of choice in science, the company grew thanks to its expertise in publishing English scientific literature. In 1937, Elsevier Publishing Company NV established a joint-venture branch in New York , Elsevier Press Inc. started in 1951 in Houston, Texas, and in 1962 publishing offices were opened in London and New York. Multiple mergers in the 1970s led to name changes, settling at Elsevier Scientific Publishers in 1979. Two years before the merger with Reed, Elsevier acquired Pergamon Press in the UK.

Reed Elsevier conducts its business through a number of subsidiary companies:

• The science and medical publishing division is Elsevier.
• The legal publishing division is LexisNexis.
• The education division is Harcourt Education.
• The business division is Reed Business Information

ScienceDirect contains over 25% of the world's science, technology and medicine full text and bibliographic information.

Scopus is the world's largest abstract and citation database of research literature and quality web sources. Scopus is updated daily.

Reed Business, Reed Elsevier's global Business division, is a provider of magazines, exhibitions, directories, online media and marketing services across five continents. Its prestige brands serve professionals across a diverse range of industries. These brands include Variety, New Scientist, totaljobs.com, Elsevier, Kellysearch, and the World Travel & Tourism Market.

Harcourt is Reed Elsevier's educational publishing division, in February 2007 Reed Elsevier announced its intention to sell its education arm.^[1] Harcourt Education has a leading market position in the US and among other English speaking territories including the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and Southern Africa. Harcourt's international publishing imprints include Heinemann.

Reed Elsevier has been criticised for its pricing policies, especially Elsevier and LexisNexis. Members of the scientific community have called for a boycott of Elsevier journals and a move to open access publications such as those of the Public Library of Science or BioMed Central.

Members of the medical and scientific communities, which purchase and use many journals published by Reed Elsevier, have agitated for the company to cut its links to the arms trade. Two UK academics, Dr. Tom Stafford of Sheffield University and Dr Nick Gill, have launched petitions calling on Reed Elsevier to stop organising arms fairs. [1][2]. A subsidiary, Spearhead, organizes defence shows, including a recent event where it was reported that cluster bombs and extremely powerful riot control equipment were offered for sale.^[2][3]

In February 2007, Richard Smith, former editor of the British Medical Journal, published an editorial in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, arguing that Reed Elsevier's involvement in both the arms trade and medical publishing constituted a conflict of interest.^[4] He suggested that if academics began to disengage with Reed Elsevier, the company would be likely to end their arms fairs, as arms fairs only comprise a small proportion of their business.

1. ^ Reed Elsevier to sell education arm. Retrieved on February 21, 2007.
2. ^ Shah, Saeed. "Cluster bombs on offer at arms fair despite sales ban", The Independent, 2005-09-14. Retrieved on February 21, 2007.
3. ^ Norton-Taylor, Richard. "Banned stun guns and leg irons advertised at arms fair", The Guardian, 2005-09-16. Retrieved on February 21, 2007.
4. ^ Smith, Richard. "Lancet publishers condemned over promotion of arms", Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 2007-02-20. Retrieved on March 18, 2007.

• Guardian Unlimited, Bad Science by Ben Goldacre about Open Access and DSEI arms trade
• ketupa.net media profile: Reed Elsevier historical overview
• Double Dutch No Longer in-depth article about the company from 2002 (Forbes.com)

• Official web site Reed Elsevier
• Official web site Elsevier
• Official web site LexisNexis
• Official web site Harcourt
• Official web site Reed Business
• Attorney directory for consumers from Reed Elsevier LexisNexis

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