BRITANNICA FINDS BUYER
By Adnews Staff
Swiss financier Jacob Safra is buying the whole set of Encyclopaedia Britannica. The price was not disclosed when the sale of the company was announced this week, but earlier this year analysts in the U.S. said the company could fetch up to $650 million(US). Britannica is owned by the William Benton Foundation of the University of Chicago, and the university will get the money from the sale. The Britannica series was started 227 years ago in Edinburgh, Scotland. Its 32 volumes hold 44 million words and a set retails for $1,500(US). Its contributors have included Albert Einstein, Sigmund Freud and Madame Curie. However, Britannica has been losing sales in recent years as people turn to electronic encyclopedias such as those produced by Comptons Multimedia and Grolier. The electronic competitors sell for a fraction of the cost of Britannica and are often bundled free with home computers. The 51,000 Britannicas sold in the U.S. last year were less than half the total of 1990. Britannica's entry in the electronic age has so far consisted of a CD-ROM holding all the text but lacking the video clips, sounds and other features its competitors use, and a World Wide Web site that carries a $150(US) yearly subscription fee.