Thomson Buys Legal Publisher: Media giant International...

Thomson Buys Legal Publisher: Media giant International Thomson Organization Ltd. announced that it agreed to buy Lawyers Co-operative Publishing Co. of Rochester, N.Y., for $810 million. Thomson will become one of the top three legal publishers in North America with a winning bid for the publisher of printed and electronic legal, tax and business law research and products. It had $200 million in revenue last year. The purchase price, at 27 times estimated earnings, “is an expensive acquisition,” an analyst said, but less than the 40 times earnings for which such specialty publishing companies are often acquired.