FT Restructures Units, Names Clark To Head IDSI

Financial Times Information, a division of the Financial Times Group, has reorganized its newly-acquired Interactive Data Services Inc. (IDSI) group and has restructured its related securities businesses along geographical lines. As part of the reorg, FT Information has bid farewell to John Rutherfurd, the long-time president of IDSI, and has appointed Stuart Clark to replace him. Rutherfurd has taken a post as a managing director at Dun & Bradstreet Corp.'s Moody's Investors Service Inc.; Clark, who most recently served as the director of FT Information's FT Extel unit, will report directly to FT Information managing director Martin Brooks.

The swap of Rutherfurd for Clark comes in the wake of the recent purchase of IDSI by Pearson PLC -- the U.K.-based newspaper conglomerate that serves as the holding company for both the Financial Times Group and FT Information. Pearson PLC coughed up some $201 million to Dun & Bradstreet to acquire IDSI this summer (IMD, July 31). At that same time, FT Information also signed a five-year agreement with Moody's to create a database of companies listed on stock exchanges around the world.

By purchasing IDSI -- a Lexington, Mass.-based market data vendor which has a North American clientele and a historical database that primarily covers North American securities -- Pearson is hoping to provide a North American complement to FT Extel, a vendor which has a European customer base and a primarily European and Asian historical database. FT Extel was formed after the Financial Times Group, through its parent, acquired Extel Financial Ltd. in 1993 (Dealing with Technology, Dec. 17, 1993).

Clark will have other duties in addition to his role as IDSI's president. According to an internal memorandum acquired by IMD, Clark will be "responsible for the overall coordination and strategy of [FT Information's] securities business worldwide reporting to Brooks." The memo -- dated Sept. 18 and issued by Brooks -- also says that Sharon Rowlands and Mark Hynes, FT Information's regional directors in North America and Asia Pacific, respectively, have assumed additional responsibilities.

Brooks says that while Rowlands will continue in her role as regional director, she will also be "responsible for all the non-securities activities of FT Information in North America." Row- land's primary duty, Brooks says, will be to manage the agreement FT Information signed with Moody's. But she will also be on the lookout for other possible acquisitions in North America.

To compensate for Rowlands' extra workload, Brooks has shifted responsibility for FT Extel's North American securities revenue and customers from Rowlands to Wayne Channer, IDSI's vice president of sales and marketing.

Hynes, for his part, will assume responsibility for all the "non-Japanese Interactive Data revenue and customers" in the Asia Pacific region, according to Brooks. Hynes will not have to worry about IDSI in Japan, Brooks says, because that business was sold to Japanese Telecom giant Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp. (NTT) by Dun & Bradstreet. Brooks says that IDSI still has some "technical and legal" ties to NTT, but declines to elaborate.

For the time being, Brooks says, Clark's post at FT Extel in Europe remains vacant.

Under FT Information's new restructuring plan, IDSI will assume responsibility for FT Extel's securities activities in North America. Conversely, FT Extel will assume control of IDSI's securities businesses in Europe and the Far East. One source close to the restructuring says that the fact that Clark has been appointed president of IDSI strongly suggests that FT Extel will soon cease to exist as an autonomous entity in North America. Says this source: "Stuart being appointed president of IDSI effectively brings those two units together."

By the same token, this source says, it is reasonable to assume that the Interactive Data name will fade into oblivion in Europe and the Far East in favor of FT Extel -- a more well-known and respected vendor in those regions. "I would assume that the IDSI name would not be used in the U.K. anymore. Same thing in Asia," this source says. "They're doing it geographically."

But Brooks says it is too early to tell whether FT Information will abandon either the FT Extel or IDSI name in any region. In North America, Brooks says, FT Extel will focus its efforts on providing "company information" -- i.e., information such as profit/loss and balance sheet data. But Brooks says that IDSI's duties will not change materially in Europe and Asia Pacific. "IDSI will continue to provide the services they provide today under the FT Extel umbrella," he says.

Still, Brooks admits that it is inevitable that IDSI and Extel will become more intertwined. Says Brooks: "Clearly, some of the activities between Extel and Interactive Data will become over time much more closely coordinated."

According to Brooks, FT Information has four companies under its umbrella: In addition to FT Extel and IDSI, FT Information also oversees FT Profile (an online database publisher) and Broadcast Monitoring Co. (a vendor of media monitoring services). Brooks says these four firms are split into two categories -- financial information and general business information -- with FT Extel and IDSI belonging to the former category and FT Profile and Broadcast Monitoring falling into the latter.

Brooks says that FT Information intends to make further "public announcements" in the near future to clarify the group's organizational structure.