DDW completes Newman-Stein acquisition

Data Development Worldwide (DDW) has completed its acquisition of Newman Stein, adding to its market research capabilities.

DDW's purchase of Newman Stein began in the final quarter of 2007. Both companies provide research and actionable insights to marketers, but Newman Stein adds depth to the company's product testing offerings.

“While they operate in the same space, which is primary market research, they brought back to us a capacity that we didn't have much of anymore,” explained Chip Lister, president of DDW. “They are top-shelf in the world of product testing, so it really added a breadth to our capacity. The other side is that, having known the company for quite a while, I knew it was an easy fit.”

Newman-Stein has been fully integrated with DDW, moving New York employees into DDW offices there. The two companies also combined offices in San Francisco. For a year-long interim period, Newman-Stein will be known as “Newman-Stein, a division of DDW,” but soon the company will function completely within DDW.

DDW took on all of Newman-Stein's clients, with no attrition.

There were no layoffs as the result of the acquisition, though Newman-Stein principle Larry Newman will follow through with his retirement plans, announced earlier. William Stein, also a Newman-Stein principle, is now a DDW director.

Lister said that more growth was on the horizon for DDW. The company is looking at other acquisition targets and is also interested in establishing offices outside US.

“At this stage in the game, I don't think we would go too far afield from our core equities,” Lister said, when asked about growth areas. “What Newman-Stein did was round out our core equity, but I don't think I would buy a company completely outside our core equity. Anything we do at this point is going to be linear to who and what we are and adding manpower.”