Penguin Random House CEO steps down weeks after judge blocked Simon & Schuster merger

Penguin Random House said Friday that CEO Markus Dohle volition measurement down astatine the extremity of the year, weeks aft the illness of a woody to merge Penguin with Simon & Schuster.

Nihar Malaviya, Penguin's president and operating chief, volition measurement successful arsenic interim CEO portion the publishing institution finds Dohle's imperishable replacement.

"Following the antitrust determination successful the U.S. against the merger of Penguin Random House and Simon & Schuster, I person decided, aft astir 15 years connected the Executive Board of Bertelsmann and astatine the helm of our planetary publishing business, to manus implicit the adjacent section of Penguin Random House to caller leadership," Dohle said successful a property release.

A national justice sided with the Justice Department and blocked Penguin's $2.2 cardinal acquisition of Simon & Schuster successful precocious October. The DOJ claimed that a merger of the industry-dominating publishers could "lessen competition" successful the market.

Soon after the judge's decision, Paramount Global, which owns Simon & Schuster, officially pulled the plug connected the deal. Paramount noted that it would research options to merchantability Simon & Schuster elsewhere.

Penguin disagreed with the DOJ's ruling and had planned to entreaty until Paramount subsequently backed retired of the deal.

"We regret Markus Dohle's determination to permission Bertelsmann and Penguin Random House," said Christoph Mohn, president of Penguin genitor Bertelsmann's supervisory board. "He has sustainably focused Penguin Random House connected maturation and profitability. Under his leadership, our publication part much than doubled its revenues and quintupled its profit."