The new owner of the Yellow Pages business, Yell, has vowed to strengthen its grip on printed directories and will look at further acquisitions.


Two private-equity firms, Apax Partners and Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst, bought Yell from BT for 2.14bn last week.
BT sold the group, which includes Yellow Pages printed by RR Donnelley and the USAs Yellow Book, to reduce its debt. Yell has pre-tax profits of 163m on a turnover of 774m.


Apax director Stephen Green said: We aim to grow through organic development and with acquisitions that the management team chooses to make.
But we will not shift from the printed medium and though the internet side will hopefully continue to grow, that is complementary rather than a replacement.
RR Donnelley UK managing director Roy Houston said: We have been printing the directories for 17 years and this does not really affect us. But I think the independence will be good for Yell.


A Yell spokesman said: Cutting the umbilical cord from BT frees us to pursue our objectives for classified advertising in the UK and the US. The deal will give us greater flexibility as an independent business to capitalise on the UK market.
RR Donnelley started full-colour trials on directories earlier this year (PrintWeek, 19 January) and recently moved to a 37m plant at Knaresborough.


Yell distributed almost 29m directories last year with the US arm, Yellow Book, distributing 17.5m.
The sale is being probed by US anti-trust lawyers and is due to go through in late June.
Story by Jez Abbott