EMIS, a research service for emerging markets, was sold by Euromonitor Institutional Investor to CITIC Capital and Chinese media company Caixin Global back in April. CITIC is an alternative investment management and advisory company. Also included in the sale was CEIC data, a provider of global time series data. The two businesses, jointly named ISI Emerging Markets, have been run in parallel and will continue to do so, but sales operations have been merged. Sales continues to be organized regionally, and some product specialization will be retained.
ISI is headquartered in Hong Kong with offices in eighteen countries. The firm has over 500 employees located in both emerging and developed countries. The two firms reported an operating profit of £11.9 million ($15.1 million), as disclosed in the notes to Euromoney’s 2017 annual accounts. The firms reported 2016 revenue of about $52.7 million and EBITDA of $14.5 million. Based on 2016 turnover and the $180.5 million purchase price, the deal had a 3.4 multiple.
EMIS delivers news, research, analytical data, and peer comparisons for over 125 emerging markets. The content is multi-lingual and serves researchers, industry analysts, corporate strategists, credit analysts, and business development professionals. Customers are found in corporate and investment banking, consultancies, private equity, government, and academia.
EMIS displays news and research from 7,000 publications and 3.6 million emerging market company profiles, two million of which include financials. Industry sources include BMI Research, Technavio, MarketLine, Mintel, and Euromonitor. Sixteen languages are supported for content and UI along with cross-translations between the languages.
The products have regional strengths. CEIC began with a Chinese focus twenty-five years ago and is strongest in Asia. EMIS began in Eastern Europe, but now generates half of its revenue in the Americas. Asia now represents 25% of its revenue with India its fastest growing market.
Chief Product Officer Diego Obere said that “the majority of our employees are based in emerging markets, allowing us to establish an unrivalled level of expertise on these often opaque countries.” The firm’s “focus [is] on providing our clients with information on countries that are classed as emerging markets. Over 90% of our 5,000+ content sources are from emerging markets”.
The product roadmap includes an improved EMIS UX, upgraded industry pages, and investments in improved mobile and API access.
Channel-wise, EMIS partnered with EBSCO and ProQuest for university distribution. The firm supports both subscription access and on-demand research purchases.