• February 14, 2006

VNU, the Dutch marketing and media research giant and trade magazine publisher that is contemplating an $8 billion-plus buy-out offer from a group of private equity-firms, may elect to break itself up instead if some big shareholders have its way. While its unclear how VNU's board will react to the proposal, the Wall Street Journal reports that the shareholders are pushing to break VNU up into three parts: presumably a marketing research company dominated by ACNielsen, a media research company dominated by Nielsen Media Research, and a publishing company. In either case, the proposal adds to the likelihood that VNU will be dismembered. If the private equity bid is successful, those firms are expected to break up VNU and sell off the pieces.