Cengage Group

History

International Thomson Publishing entered the publishing business by buying Wadsworth Publishing in 1979. In 1981 International Thomson purchased the publishing operations of Litton Industries, including Van Nostrand Reinhold and Delmar. International Thomson acquired reference publisher Gale Research in 1985. International Thomson acquired South-Western Publishing from SFN in 1986. In 1992, Thomson acquired Course Technology. In 1995, Thomson acquired educational reference publisher Peterson's. In 1997, Van Nostrand Reinhold was sold to John Wiley & Sons.

In 2000, Thomson Learning was created out of a restructuring of International Thomson Publishing. Later that year Thomson acquired the higher education title of Harcourt from Reed Elsevier, and the test prep publisher Arco from IDG Books. In 2002, Wadsworth acquired F.E. Peacock Publishers. It was announced on October 25, 2006, that Thomson Learning would be offered for sale by the Thomson Corporation, with an estimated value of up to US$5 billion. The company was bought by a private equity consortium consisting of Apax Partners and OMERS Capital Partners for US$7.75 billion, and the name was changed to Cengage Learning on July 24, 2007. In 2007, Cengage Learning sold Peterson's to Nelnet.

In 2011, Cengage Learning acquired the National Geographic Society's school publishing unit, and combined this school business with the Global ELT business to create and launch the National Geographic Learning brand. The global brand combined the former Cengage Learning ELT and National Geographic School Publishing imprints and sub-brands under one unified identity.

In September 2013, David Shaffer retired as chairman of the company. He had previously been executive vice president of The Thomson Corporation from 2005 to 2006, and then President and CEO of both Thomson Publishing International and Thomson Learning.

The company had acquired significant debt during its initial buyout and subsequent acquisitions, and experienced declining revenues as the market for paper textbooks contracted. Cengage Learning filed for bankruptcy under Chapter 11 on July 2, 2013. Cengage Learning emerged from bankruptcy on April 1, 2014, eliminating approximately $4 billion of its funded debt and securing $1.75 billion in exit financing. Post-bankruptcy, the company decided to focus on developing digital study guides and other educational supplements, as well as hard-copy textbooks. The company moved its headquarters from Stamford, Connecticut, to Boston.

In January 2015, they announced expansion of their LearnLaunch Accelerator program, which provides seed funding and intensive coaching to promising startups, to the University of Chihuahua in Mexico.

In November 2016, Cengage Learning rebranded as simply Cengage.

In May 2019, Cengage announced its potential merger with another major publisher, McGraw-Hill Education, thereby creating a duopoly with Pearson in the market and would have used McGraw-Hill as the merged corporate name with Michael Hansen as CEO. | access-date = June 6, 2019 It is estimated Cengage has 24% of the market while McGraw-Hill has 21%, Pearson, the current market leader, has about 40 percent of the market and Wiley has about 7 percent.

The merger was called off on May 1, 2020.

In August 2021, Cengage rebranded as Cengage Group.

Acquisitions

In addition to organic growth, Cengage has expanded through acquisitions within the publishing industry. Notable acquisitions include:

Products

Cengage Unlimited

On December 5, 2017, Cengage announced Cengage Unlimited, a subscription service that allows students to pay for access to the company's entire digital higher education catalog by the semester or year, rather than buying individual textbooks. This service became available during summer 2018, and was reported to be "in line with expectations" with its initial sales goal. The University of Missouri is the first university to offer this plan to all students, effective January 2019.

Brands/imprints

The company's product lines include 4LTR Press, Aplia, Cengage Learning PTR, Chilton, Education To Go, Gale, Milady, MindTap, and National Geographic Learning.

Since 2015, South-Western products have been branded as Cengage Learning.

Cengage Unlimited, a SaaS solution, launched on August 1, 2018.

Rankings

In 2024, based on its 2015 revenues, Publishers Weekly ranked the company 15 out of 47 publishers worldwide, based on revenues of $1,503,000,000 (US). The list includes both trade and educational publishers.

References

References

1. (June 27, 2014) [http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/publisher-news/article/63020-global-publishing-leaders-2014-cengage.html Global Publishing Leaders 2014: Cengage] {{webarchive. link. (June 12, 2015 publishersweekly.com)
2. Company Info – Wall Street Journal. [http://quotes.wsj.com/CNGO/company-people Cengage Learning] {{webarchive. link. (June 18, 2015)
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4. "Global Publishing Leaders 2017: Cengage Learning Holdings II LP". PublishersWeekly.com.
5. "Ed publishing firm Cengage will move into new Pier 4 building – The Boston Globe". BostonGlobe.com.
6. [http://www.caul.edu.au/caul-programs/ceirc/publishers/gale Gale : A Cengage Learning Company] {{Webarchive. link. (October 17, 2013 CAUL (Council of Australian University Librarians))
7. Mehegan, David. (January 26, 2002). "Little, Brown Shrinking Again". Boston Globe.
8. (May 8, 1985). "Sale to International Thomson of Publisher Is Set for $66 Million". Wall Street Journal.
9. Landro, Laura. (October 15, 1986). "SFN to Sell Unit to Time For $520 Million – Sale of Another Subsidiary To a Canadian Concern Is Set for $270 Million". Wall Street Journal.
10. Diamond, Howard. (November 24, 1992). "Thomson Acquires Course Technology, Inc.". [[Business Wire]].
11. (October 30, 1995). "Thomson acquires Peterson's Guides". [[Publishers Weekly]].
12. Chen, David W.. (October 10, 1997). "Metro Business; John Wiley Acquires A Trade Book Unit". The New York Times.
13. "PW: Thomson Learning Adapts to Market".
14. (October 27, 2000). "The Thomson Corporation to Acquire Select Harcourt Business Units From Reed Elsevier". Business Wire.
15. (June 12, 2000). "Thomson Learning Acquires ARCO Imprint from IDGB; Peterson's to Provide Consumers a Singular Resource for a Wide Range of Test-Prep Materials and Information". Business Wire.
16. "Wadsworth buys F.E. Peacock Publishers Inc.". San Francisco Business Times.
17. Thomas, Helen (October 25, 2006) [https://web.archive.org/web/20171128071043/https://ftalphaville.ft.com/2006/10/25/417/wsj-reports-thomson-may-put-learning-unit-on-the-block Thomson to put learning unit on the block.] FT Alphaville. Financial Times.
18. (October 25, 2006) [http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/2006/10/25/thomson_to_sell_education_units Thomson to sell education units] {{webarchive. link. (June 5, 2015 Boston.com)
19. (July 2, 2013). "Cengage Learning Files for Bankruptcy". New York Times.
20. (July 27, 2006). "Nelnet Acquires Peterson's". Nelnet.
21. Jinks, Beth (June 24, 2011) [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2011-06-24/apax-s-cengage-buying-national-geographic-s-school-publishing-unit Apax's Cengage Buying National Geographic's School Publisher] {{webarchive. link. (July 31, 2016 Bloomberg.com)
22. Edgecliffe-Johnson, Andrew (July 6, 2013) [https://www.ft.com/content/957d4318-c6f1-11e1-95ea-00144feabdc0 Debt-laden Cengage in hunt for new chief] {{webarchive. link. (July 14, 2012 [[The Financial Times]])
23. [https://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/private/person.asp?personId=1134132&privcapId=515275 Executive Profile – David H. Shaffer] bloomberg.com
24. Howard, Jennifer (July 3, 2013) [http://chronicle.com/article/Publishers-Bankruptcy-Filing/140103/ Publisher's Bankruptcy Filing Comes as Market for Print Textbooks Shrinks] {{webarchive. link. (May 12, 2015 The Chronicle of Higher Education)
25. (April 15, 2014). "Textbook publisher quits Stamford for Boston". [[Associated Press News]].
26. Borchers, Callum (April 1, 2014) [https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2014/04/01/cengage-emerges-from-bankruptcy-with-boston-its-electronic-publishing-base/unXD00onI6Bxagr5sx9yOJ/story.html Cengage exits bankruptcy, focuses on e-books in Boston] {{webarchive. link. (September 15, 2014 bostonglobe.com)
27. "Boston ed-tech firm Cengage Learning announces the expansion of LearnLaunch to Latin America".
28. "McGraw-Hill, Cengage Agree to Merge".
29. (March 11, 2020). "College textbook merger raises 'serious concern' among U.S. lawmakers". Reuters.
30. (May 4, 2020). "McGraw-Hill, Cengage Jointly Agree to Terminate Planned Merger". [[Bloomberg News.
31. MacFadyen, Ken (June 9, 2008) [http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/thomson-course-technology-acquires-education-to-go-to-expand-continuing-education-offerings-58682417.html Thomson Course Technology Acquires Education To Go To Expand Continuing Education Offerings] {{webarchive. link. (January 29, 2016)
32. MacFadyen, Ken (June 9, 2008) [http://www.themiddlemarket.com/mar/2008_23/182761-1.html Cengage Buys Houghton Mifflin's College Unit] {{webarchive. link. (June 5, 2015 themiddlemarket.com)
33. [https://www.owler.com/iaApp/poll/52987836e4b0a36bb5790216/cengage-learning/good-or-bad-move-for-cengage-learning-.htm Cengage Learning Acquired Gatlin Education Services. Was this a good decision? owler.com] {{dead link. (November 2017)
34. [http://www.libraries.wright.edu/noshelfrequired/2008/12/16/highbeam-research-now-part-of-galecengage/ Polanka, Sue (Dec 16, 2008)] {{webarchive. link. (June 5, 2015 No Shelf Required – Wright State University Libraries)
35. (September 27, 2016). "Cengage Acquires WebAssign, Strengthening Market Position in Science, Technology and Math". Cengage.
36. (March 2, 2022). "Cengage Group Completes Acquisition of Infosec".
37. Whooley, Sean. (2025-02-12). "Medtronic acquires nanotech from Nanovis for interbody fusion systems".
38. "Boston publisher launches a Netflix for textbooks – The Boston Globe".
39. (November 8, 2018). "Promising Early Sales for Cengage Unlimited". Inside Higher Ed.
40. (November 16, 2018). "University of Missouri System Chooses Cengage Unlimited Subscriptions to Save Students Money on Course Materials". Business Insider.
41. [http://solutions.cengage.com/brands/south-western/ "There's a new way to find South-Western titles"] {{webarchive. link. (April 8, 2017 , Cengage Learning. Retrieved April 8, 2017.)
42. (August 4, 2018) [https://news.elearninginside.com/cengage-unlimited-has-arrived/ eLearning Inside News: Cengage]
43. (2024-11-25). "RELX Stays the World’s Largest Publisher in 2024". Publishers Weekly.