Pitney Bowes has appointed Murray Martin as its new chief executive officer, launched a $300million stock buyback and made another acquisition.
Martin replaces Michael Critelli, who assumes the newly-created position of executivechairman. The changeover will take place on 14 May. President of the company, and until now itschief operating officer, Martin has also been appointed to the board of directors. “He will assumefull strategic and operational responsibility for the company, overseeing its overall performancewith a focus on sustaining increased shareholder, customer and employee value,” Pitney Bowes saidin a statement.
The US-based mailstream specialist also announced a further $300 million stock buyback to becompleted by the end of the year. The move is part of the company’s ongoing plan to deliverenhanced shareholder value, Critelli said. “We will continue to invest for growth, while alsoproviding more immediate returns to shareholders through our dividend yield and by repurchasingshares,” he promised.
Meanwhile, the company is buying intelligence solutions provider Mapinfo for $408 million incash, the second acquisition it has announced this month, following the purchase of Spring GlobalMail’s US business from TNT, Royal Mail and Singapore Post, as it expands vertically into thepostal services sector.
MapInfo’s intelligence solutions tools and services are used by more than 7,000 organisationsworldwide, in virtually every industry, said Pitney Bowes.
MapInfo generated $165 million in revenue in its last fiscal year 2006. Headquartered inTroy, New York, it has 940 employees worldwide, with locations in the USA, Canada, Europe,Australia and Asia.
“We are excited about the acquisition of MapInfo because it leverages our current expertisein location intelligence to deliver a broader range of advanced solutions for retail,communications, insurance, financial services and the public sector, as well as strengthening ourcustomer communication management offering,” said Critelli.
“This transaction extends our global reach, enriches our location intelligence offerings andbuilds upon the growing software platform that we established with the acquisition of Group 1 in2004,” the executive chairman elect added.
