Lexis acquires Mealey Publications, Inc.

DAYTON, OH, August 3, 2000 – LEXIS, a unit of Reed Elsevier Inc., has acquired Mealey Publications, Inc., a leading niche publisher of legal newsletters targeted at attorneys and other professionals in the areas of litigation and arbitration. The company also produces 30 annual conferences on hot litigation topics, such as toxic torts, environmental insurance, construction defects, tobacco and asbestos.

"Mealey’s helps attorneys, corporations and insurance carriers keep up with breaking news and fast-changing areas of law, where established legal precedent is being challenged," said LEXIS President and CEO, Lou Andreozzi. "News and current awareness materials are highly desired by legal professionals, and Mealey’s publications and conferences help them stay abreast of breaking news, new developments in the law, pending government legislation and litigation trends.

"While we license Mealey’s publications and make them available through LEXIS today, this acquisition will allow us to truly integrate Mealey’s content into our robust portfolio of legal research materials. For instance, through lexis.comsm, we can provide links to full text of cases, legislation and news sources to efficiently give attorneys a more complete subject view via a single gateway. Mealey’s content will also further strengthen a number of our lexis.com practice pages, which offer a customized practice approach for specialized areas of law," Andreozzi added.

The company plans to continue Mealey’s tradition of developing new titles on emerging areas of law and to use LEXIS’ electronic distribution channels to reach more legal professionals with the premium Mealey’s content. LEXIS also plans to continue to expand the conference business to meet plaintiff and defense attorneys’ demands for expert opinion and industry discussion on fast-changing and new areas of law.

LEXIS’ business consists of five leading legal information brands: LEXIS®-NEXIS® (online research), Shepard’s® (citations), Matthew Bender® (treatises), Martindale-Hubbell® (legal reference) and MICHIE™ (indexed and annotated statutes). Serving the ever-changing needs of today’s legal practitioners, LEXIS (www.lexis-nexis.com) is a member of the Reed Elsevier plc group.