Judge Blocks Penguin Random House Merger With Simon & Schuster

deadline.com:

A federal judge ruled in favor of the Justice Department in its effort to block to merger of Penguin Random House with Simon & Schuster.

In granting an injunction to halt the transaction, Judge Florence Pan wrote that the companies were “enjoined and restrained from consummating the proposed merger, or otherwise effecting a combination of Penguin Random House, LLC, and Simon & Schuster, Inc.” Pan’s full opinion has yet to be made public, but she wrote that she found that “the United States has shown that ‘the effect of [the proposed merger] may be substantially to lessen competition’ in the market for the U.S.

publishing rights to anticipated top-selling books.” Pan also ordered both sides in the case to meet to discuss proposed redactions to the opinion, which was kept under seal because it included confidential corporate information.

Her ruling is a significant victory for the Biden-era Justice Department, which challenged the $2.2 billion transaction on the basis of its impact on the workforce, rather than on consumers, as is typically the case.