Expands presence with leading legal Asia media business

SINGAPORE, March 25, 2011 – Thomson Reuters today announced that it has acquired Asian Legal Business, a leading provider of print and online legal news and information for legal professionals in China, North and South East Asia, Japan, Australia and the Middle East. Asian Legal Business has 30 employees with offices in Hong Kong, Singapore and Sydney and will be aligned with the Thomson Reuters portfolio of Asia-Pacific legal businesses. Terms were not disclosed.

Tony Kinnear, senior vice president of the Asia region for the legal businesses of Thomson Reuters, said Asian Legal Business is a powerful complement to the Thomson Reuters portfolio of products and services used by practitioners in the region. “Our strategic focus is to provide legal practitioners with the tools to best support their practice and business needs, and our customers look to us for authoritative content and business intelligence, plus business development tools and services. At Thomson Reuters, we call this ‘The Knowledge Effect’, and Asian Legal Business spans each of these areas: its editorial is well regarded for its insights and analysis of legal industry news, and it is widely viewed as an important channel for law firms looking to build their presence in the region,” he noted.  

Asian Legal Business was founded in 2002, and serves fast-growing Asian markets and is an important marketing vehicle for established and emerging law firms. The company publishes four regional monthly journals covering China, North Asia, Southeast Asia, Japan and Australasia, and produces legalbusinessonline.com, which provides breaking legal news, deals and analysis. It also produces the Annual Law Awards and In-House Counsel Summits, a series of events and seminars held in Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Singapore, Sydney and Auckland.

Asian Legal Business adds a critical dimension to the Thomson Reuters strategy to expand its legal market footprint in the Asia region. Asian Legal Business complements the Thomson Reuters strategy of developing regional legal news that can be leveraged across its global portfolio of online legal information services and publications.

“There are already more than one million legal practitioners in the Asia region, and Asian Legal Business is viewed as required reading for the region’s leading law firms, in-house counsel and C-suite executives,” noted Kinnear. “We intend to build on Asian Legal Business’ great legacy of innovation and excellence, supporting the growth of the profession in this important region. We are pleased that Asian Legal Business is now part of Thomson Reuters.”

Thomson Reuters
Thomson Reuters is the world’s leading source of intelligent information for businesses and professionals. We combine industry expertise with innovative technology to deliver critical information to leading decision makers in the financial, legal, tax and accounting, healthcare and science and media markets, powered by the world’s most trusted news organization. With headquarters in New York and major operations in London and Eagan, Minnesota, Thomson Reuters employs 55,000 people in more than 100 countries. Thomson Reuters shares are listed on the Toronto and New York Stock Exchanges (symbol: TRI). For more information, go to www.thomsonreuters.com.

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