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Riverdeep to bid for Harcourt

The boss of Irish educational software publisher Riverdeep is looking at making a bid for the education arm of Reed Elsevier, reports the Financial Times. Barry O'Callaghan is considering a 2 billion pounds bid for Reed Elsevier's educational publishing business, months after his educational software group completed a 2.6 billion pounds reverse takeover of Houghton Mifflin, the US school textbook publisher.

The FT cites "three people familiar with the matter" as saying that O'Callaghan was "very interested" in the potential cost savings and other benefits of combining Harcourt with HM Riverdeep, the vehicle with which he bought the larger Houghton Mifflin.

Reed announced it was selling the education business to focus on its faster-growing legal, science and medical and business-to-business interests.

Financial Times

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