Following the sale of ECN to Advantage Business Media, it was pretty obvious that Reed would be looking for a new US sales channel for their European and Asian electronics titles. The successful company is JAS Technical Media, who will manage all US sales of EPN, EPN France, ECN Asia, ECN China, WD&D Asia and WD&D China. Somewhat confusingly the deal is that JAS will take over sales for issues from February 2008, leaving customers with two reps to deal with for bookings in the first quarter of next year.
It will be interesting to see the effects of the change. The ECN sales team did a pretty good job, particularly selling EPN, and JAS will have to work hard to maintain this business. With JAS prepared to invest in developing their contacts to sell these titles, the long-predicted death of the product book in print is still some way off!