What’s Next for Legacy UK B2B Brand Centaur Media?
The future of legacy UK B2B media brand Centaur Media is uncertain.
The company’s executive chair Martin Rowland said as much in an annual report published in early April, which outlines his plans to review Centaur Media’s business units with a focus “on defining future strategy and enhancing the reputation of the brands within Centaur to maximize shareholder value.”
The firm’s two key drivers of revenue—B2B media company The Lawyer and marketing learning platform Mini MBA—are completely different businesses.
“You can’t sum up what the company is or what it’s trying to do,” one media industry observer who is familiar with the firm’s business model told AMO. “That’s really the heart of it, that’s their problem.”
“It has taken some big strategic missteps, and now it’s just one of those leftovers of a bygone era that makes no sense,” the person said. “It doesn’t mean the brands are terrible. They’ve got some good properties there, but the company itself doesn’t make sense.”
About Centaur
Centaur Media, founded in 1981, initially published B2B print magazines, which had controlled circulations, but over time transitioned into digital, events and information services. But the business has been shrinking as revenue has declined over the past four years. In 2024, the firm reported revenue of £35 million ($45 million), down 6% from the prior year. It also reported its first net loss since 2020, losing £9.6 million ($12 million) compared to a net income of £4.8 million ($6.3 million) the prior year.
The Lawyer and Mini MBA drove revenue growth of 7% and 5%, respectively. The Lawyer, which has been in business for nearly 40 years, saw growth in premium content of 11% over 2023 driven by a combined 111% renewal rate from its subscription products and a 59% increase in new business.
Mini MBA, Centaur’s largest brand which distills a full MBA program for marketing and brand management into 12-week courses, makes up 31% of Centaur’s revenue and saw a 22% increase in corporate sales last year.
Marketing makes up 75% of Centaur’s revenues, which includes Mini MBA, while The Lawyer makes up the remaining 25%. Centaur’s annual report noted that marketing customers were cautious last year and cutting back on budgets, which ended up hurting Centaur’s other businesses including ecommerce training provider Econsultancy, which saw a 21% drop in yearly revenue in 2024.
Over the years, Centaur has divested a number of titles, including its financial services titles and travel exhibitions, to streamline operations, but Edison Group analyst Fiona Orford-Williams wrote in a report commissioned by Centaur Media that there is “always more to do to optimize the offerings.”
That’s exactly what Rowland is focusing on. He was placed in the executive chair position in December by activist investor Harwood Capital, which has a 29% stake in the company, after the firm’s CEO Swag Mukerji retired. There’s been no replacement for Mukerji in the CEO role, nor any mention of a potential replacement.
In an email to AMO, Centaur Media’s Chief Financial Officer Simon Longfield said the firm is not looking for a new CEO and that investors can expect to hear the preliminary results of the strategic review as part of the interim results in July.
Time for a Breakup?
“The only thing that I can see happening to it is that it’s probably broken up and sold for the sum of its parts to try and get some shareholder value back,” the unnamed media observer said.
Rowland will be looking at all options, Orford-Williams told AMO, noting there is no urgency to make a decision thanks to Centaur’s cash buffer of £8.9 million ($11.3 million) and lack of debt commitments.
“They have said they are undertaking a strategic review, so it may be that the result of that review is that he’s very happy with the portfolio as it is and will look to appoint a CEO to take it forward, that’s one of the options,” she said. “Another option could be that it splits up and The Lawyer goes its own way.
I can’t prejudge what he’s going to conclude, but he’s going to be looking at it from a maximizing shareholder value perspective.”
This wouldn’t be the first time Centaur has explored a sale. It received an “expression of interest” from private equity firm Waterland in April last year—the firm later confirmed it had no intention to bid on Centaur.
In 2018, Centaur Media explored divesting The Lawyer, then six months later took the publication off the market saying it was a “more attractive option” to retain the holding as it “offers greater opportunity to create value for shareholders.”
Media analyst Colin Morrison, who runs Flashes & Flames, speculated that Rowland could potentially net £100 million ($129 million)—more than three times the company’s enterprise value of £29 million ($37 million) with Mini MBA accounting for about 60% of that.
The Mini MBA could be a bright spot in a tougher economic environment since there will be a desire to improve skill sets even in a more challenging hiring landscape, Orford-Williams said. There’s also scope for adding to the brand and offering shorter courses.
“People derive good value from it, and you see, from time to time, comparisons of what training is useful in the industry, and the Mini MBA usually does very, very well in those comps,” she said.
