When the biggest writer within the nation, Penguin Random Home, struck a deal within the fall of 2020 to accumulate its rival Simon & Schuster, publishing executives and antitrust consultants predicted that the merger would draw intense scrutiny from authorities regulators, Alexandra Alter, Elizabeth A. Harris and David McCabe report for The New York Occasions.
The merger would dramatically alter the literary panorama, shrinking the variety of main publishing homes — recognized within the business because the Huge 5 — to 4. (Or, as one business analyst put it, it might create the Huge One and the opposite three.)
Final fall, the Biden administration sued to dam the $2.18 billion sale as a part of its new and extra aggressive stance in opposition to company consolidation. The trial will begin on Monday, with oral arguments at america District Courtroom for the District of Columbia, the place Choose Florence Pan will preside.
The Justice Division and Bertelsmann, Penguin Random Home’s guardian firm, referred to as a parade of high-profile publishing executives as witnesses. They embrace Markus Dohle, the chief government of Penguin Random Home, and Jonathan Karp, the chief government of Simon & Schuster, in addition to executives from different publishing homes, literary brokers and a handful of authors.
