Factiva Acquisition of 2B Group Adds Critical Elements for Effective R

    Business Editors

    NEW YORK & LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 2, 2005--Factiva(R), a Dow Jones and Reuters Company, today accelerated its strategy to offer media monitoring and reputation management solutions for corporate communications and marketing professionals based on human expertise, visualization tools, taxonomies and text-mining technology.
    The company today announced it has acquired the business and assets of 2B Reputation Intelligence Limited and Benchmarking Solutions Limited, a London-based technology and consulting business specializing in media monitoring and reputation management. 2B provides innovative media analysis products and benchmarking expertise to corporate communications, public relations, and PR agency professionals. Through its unique data visualization tools, 2B allows customers to very quickly get an accurate understanding of market perception and issues.
    "We now have the critical pieces for an effective reputation management solution," says Clare Hart, president and CEO of Factiva. "Only the unique combination of human expertise, technology, and content will allow business people to listen to the millions of conversations taking place on the Web and in the mainstream press, understand the patterns and trends that affect their organizations, and give them intelligence that they can act upon."
    "We've learned from our experience working in the public relations sector that advanced text-mining capabilities and high-quality content are necessary elements to deliver leading-edge reputation management solutions," says Christopher Shaw, managing director, of 2B. "Factiva's unrivalled content and its leadership in advanced text-mining technologies are a powerful complement to our strengths in data visualization and media benchmarking and will allow us to develop the next-generation solutions the marketplace demands."
    With more than 20 years of experience developing corporate taxonomies, an unrivalled collection of essential business content that includes the exclusive combination of The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones and Reuters newswires, and an innovative product platform based on XML and Web services, Factiva already had a significant market lead in development of a reputation management solution. Recently, the company also signed an agreement with Fast Search & Transfer(TM) (FAST(TM)) to provide additional enabling technologies for Factiva's text-mining platform. These technologies are based upon FAST's enterprise search platform, FAST ESP(TM).
    Factiva customers using these solutions will benefit from 2B's innovative editorial and visualization tools that permit the graphical representation of trends and relationships uncovered by analyzing a relevant selection of Web content along with Factiva's collection of 9,000 authoritative sources. 2B's analysts also provide assessment of tone and sentiment, a critical aspect of effective media and reputation monitoring.
    "Communications executives looking for completely automated measurement tools today are largely disappointed. Technology alone can only measure communications so far. There will always be a need for expertise and interpretation," says John Neeson, co-founder of and media analyst at SiriusDecisions, Inc., a sales and marketing research firm based in Connecticut. "The winning vendors will offer a full solution consisting of technology-based tools and consulting services that tie public relations investment directly to business outcome."
    Factiva will integrate 2B's line of products and services into its Factiva Insight line of products and will immediately begin servicing existing 2B customers. Enhanced versions of the 2B products, beginning with media monitoring, will be launched before the end the first quarter of 2005. 2B's employees, comprised of developers, analysts and executives in London; Sofia, Bulgaria; and Cape Town, South Africa, will be joining Factiva. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

    About Factiva(R)

    Factiva, a Dow Jones & Reuters Company, provides essential business news and information together with the content delivery tools and services that enable professionals to make better decisions faster. Factiva's unrivalled collection of over 9,000 authoritative sources includes the exclusive combination of The Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, Dow Jones and Reuters newswires and the Associated Press, as well as Reuters Fundamentals, D&B, and Bureau van Dijk company profiles.
    Factiva's innovative, XML-based and Web services-enabled technology platform provides access to this rich content collection via Factiva's role-specific products or through customized enterprise, group or personal solutions. Executives, information professionals, marketers, salespeople, and other professionals can easily monitor and understand the latest news, market trends, and business challenges relevant to them - directly from the Microsoft Office and job-specific applications they use every day.

--30--TM/ny*

CONTACT: Factiva, a Dow Jones & Reuters Company Melanie Surplice, +44 207 542 8837 Fax: +44 207 542 6686 Mob: +44 799 056 1117 melanie.surplice@factiva.com or Hill & Knowlton for Factiva - US Jessica Schweitzer, 212-885-0388 jessica.schweitzer@hillandknowlton.com

KEYWORD: NEW YORK UNITED KINGDOM INTERNATIONAL EUROPE INDUSTRY KEYWORD: PUBLISHING INTERNET E-COMMERCE MERGERS/ACQ SOURCE: Factiva

Copyright Business Wire 2005