U.S. fulfillment merger makes publishers nervous

There is concern among publishers about the impact of the merger of two of the big three fulfillment companies in the U.S., according to Folio: magazine. Kable Media Services Inc. bought Palm Coast Data for $93 million and the two companies are consolidating. About 75 employees were laid off, most of them at Kable, leading Folio: to note

Palm Coast management will run the merged company, which means that even though it was Kable’s parent company that bought Palm Coast, on the management level the effect is that Palm Coast is taking over Kable.

Kable is a wholly owned subsidiary of AMREP Corporation, (as an aside, AMREP is also a major land developer in New Mexico and founded Rio Rancho, the fourth largest city in New Mexico, and the focus of its current activity "is on the entitlement, development and the sale of land for residential, commercial and industrial uses".)

The nervousness of publishers centres mostly on uncertainties about the software and systems they'll wind up using with Kable/Palm. Kable had converted about 30% of its clients from its NeoData system to something called K-data. That process will probably continue, but some clients may be moved over to Palm's systems.

The other U.S. fulfillment company is Communications Data Services (CDS), a wholly owned subsidiary of Hearst Corporation, which also owns Canada's largest fulfillment company, Indas Limited of Markham.