A double dose of data

Jul 14th 2005

 While many big pharmaceutical firms are ailing, IMS Health, which measures the industry's vital statistics, is in great shape. IMS is the leading supplier of research on the world's $550 billion prescription-drug market, tracking everything from broad industry trends to how many prescriptions for a particular drug a particular doctor in America wrote last week.
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With $1.6 billion in revenues last year [2004], IMS's dominant market position has made it an attractive takeover target. On July 11th, VNU, a Dutch market-research firm, made its move, announcing its acquisition of IMS for €5.8 billion ($7 billion).
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VNU, which earned a profit of €3.8 billion in 2004 from a portfolio of businesses including AC Nielsen, a consumer-market researcher, and Nielsen Media Research, a TV ratings group, has been flush with cash following the sale of its telephone directories business in 2004. Buying IMS Health will help the Dutch firm to diversify out of the cyclical, and currently sluggish, world of fast-moving consumer goods into the more lucrative field of health-care information.
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The company was renamed The Nielsen Company in 2007 [Wikipedia].
http://www.economist.com/node/4174879
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verenigde_Nederlandse_Uitgeverijen
http://www.nielsen.com/se/sv.html