Barry O’Callaghan has resigned his position as CEO at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. The current Chief Financial Officer, Michael Muldowney, who has been with the company since 2007, will replace him for an interim period.

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt went through a painful debt restructure in 2010 that saw shareholders wiped out. At the time O’Callaghan said that he was one of the worst affected.

O’Callaghan’s Riverdeep company built the publishing conglomerate by acquiring Houghton Mifflin and then Reed Elsevier’s education arm, Harcourt, before the collapse of credit markets in 2007.

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For our coverage of the restructure last year click here.

For more comprehensive coverage, The Financial Times, has the best background and context, while these Daily Finance stories from last year go into more details on the debt restructure.

Photographers, photo agencies, artists, and others who have contributed content to textbook publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt have filed more than 30 copyright infringement claims over the past five years in federal courts in Alaska, Florida, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, New York, Arizona, and other states. More claims are in the works, says attorney Chris Seidman of Harmon & Seidman LLC, which has represented most of the plaintiffs and has so far won settlements for about 20 of them.

“The scheme that Houghton employed was to license for the lowest amount it thought it could get away with, and then print whatever it wanted,” Seidman says. One HMH executive said in a court deposition that the publisher ignored print run limits in its photo licenses as meaningless numbers.

“It’s a compelling story of corporate greed and malfeasance,” says Seidman. “This venerable publisher has lost it’s way and veered off on a bad path of cheating the people who contribute to its existence, without whose contributions it wouldn’t exist.”

via After Flouting Print Run Limits, Publisher Faces Dozens of Lawsuits.

Irish Educational publisher CJ Fallon has worked with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (HMH) to launch a localised version of HMH’s internationally used Destination Maths.

The site is based on CJ Fallon’s Mathemagic series and can be access on the website DestinationMaths.ie.

HMH, formerly know as Riverdeep, is headed by Irishman Barry O’Callaghan. Earlier this year it underwent a radical refinancing that wiped put considerable shareholder value.

The division behind this development is HMH Innovation based in Dublin.

CJ Fallon is one of Ireland’s oldest and best known educational publishers.

Following the news from Daily Finance on Monday (covered here) that the restructure was a done deal, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt released a statement confirming the changes to the company’s financial structure claiming:

As a result of the $650-million equity investment combined with the current senior lenders’ conversion of approximately 60% of their secured debt to equity, HMH will have the strongest capital structure in its history and the financial flexibility to continue to build the world’s leading education company. This development, coupled with previous changes in the capital structure, will reduce annual interest by more than 75%.

Barry O’Callaghan was quoted as saying:

With this important development, HMH will have successfully completed a comprehensive balance sheet deleveraging that places it on the strongest financial footing in the Company’s history and positions it for continued success. Thanks to the overwhelming support from our investor base, which sees unparalleled value in our underlying business and our future prospects, we now have greater financial flexibility and freedom with a vastly improved capital structure.

Barry O’Callaghan‘s Education Media Publishing Group is close to closing its refinancing deal. The deal will see Irish investors wiped out as previously reported in early January [see our reports here (1) & here (2)].

Sarah Weinman has the exclusive and writes in Daily Finance today:

it looks as if the restructuring plan, which would inject $650 million of fresh capital and wipe out at least $475 million in the stakes of existing private-equity holders, will be completed on or around March 9.

According to an internal memo obtained by DailyFinance, EMPG CEO Barry O’Callaghan confirms earlier reports, saying that the new cash infusion “will be combined with our current lenders’ conversion of approximately 60% of their secured debt to equity in our Company. Coupled with previous changes in the capital structure, we will reduce the amount we pay for annual interest by more than 75%, giving us greater liquidity for growth.”

photo credit: waferboard

The articles and features of the second week of Irish Publishing News.

Thanks for your support, looking forward to week three.

Following some very positive coverage in the Irish Times last week, Barry O’Callaghan was given a less pleasing covering by the Sunday Independent:

BARRY O’Callaghan bet the ranch and lost big time. The Clongowes-educated financier was briefly worth “well north of a billion” before he was 40. Ever so briefly. Now with the implosion of his debt-laden publishing firm EMPG he is back to being an ordinary wage slave.

In another story, the Sunday Independent also covered the well-known Irish people who have been hurt financially by the crisis at EMPG:

Superquinn founder Feargal Quinn is thought to have invested up to €16m in Barry O’Callaghan’s EMPG publishers, which was involved in crisis talks over its €8bn debt mountain last week. Mr Quinn, who banked up to €400m from the sale of his Superquinn empire to property developers at the peak of the boom, is understood to have been one of the largest Irish investors in Mr O’Callaghan’s publishing outfit.

UPDATED: LINKS FOR FRIDAY 15th JANUARY 2010

Barry O’Callaghan (CEO of EMPG) spoke on Morning Ireland this morning. The Audio is at the end of the RTÉ article.

Wednesday saw the news leak out slowly and some of the media outlets you might have expected to report in Educational Media Publishing Group‘s troubles didn’t.

This morning most of them seem to have made up for that. What is clear is that the massive debts are to be restructured leaving a group of Irish investors seriously out of pocket.

In a radio interview on RTÉ on Thursday 14th January Barry O’Callaghan confirmed that the group was restructuring and that there would be a loss of value in the order of SEVERAL BILLION. He was personally losing several hundred million.

I’ve updated this list of stories with the newest links:

The Irish Times -1 -:

BARRY O’CALLAGHAN, the chief executive of Education Media and Publishing Group (EMPG), has told The Irish Times that he is not “broke” and he will honour every financial commitment on his investments, including the millions of euro owed to Anglo Irish Bank in relation to his equity stake in the educational publisher.

The Irish Times – 2- :

In a telephone interview with The Irish Times yesterday, O’Callaghan said this is “unfortunate” but the global economic meltdown of the past 18 months changed the rules of the game.

“I’m taking the brunt on that more than anyone else and it slightly bemuses me that I’m being positioned as the bad guy,” he said. “It’s just bad luck for me and my fellow shareholders. It’s nothing different from the people who bought houses [in the boom].”

Daily Finance:

Indeed, HMH may emerge from this debt-ridden mess with its heart still beating, ready to conduct business as usual. (In keeping with this motif, O’Callaghan will stay on as the head of the restructured company.) But O’Callaghan and CFO Michael Muldowney’s plea to company employees not to “allow yourselves to become distracted by speculation or rumors in the marketplace” doesn’t look to be heeded anytime soon — especially if the restructuring plan fails to stem the bleeding debt after all.

Publishing Perspectives:

O’Callaghan, who was once deemed the youngest billionaire in Ireland, told the Irish Times on Friday that he would repay much of his debt and would not fire any of the 300 people employed in Dublin. What’s perhaps even more surprising, he promised to go ahead with a commitment to create another 450 jobs at the company’s Irish headquarters.

The Financial Times:

The educational publisher, which competes with Pearson, owner of the Financial Times, is hoping to avoid a bankruptcy process by getting a consensual agreement in the next two or three weeks to cut total debt from about $7bn to just under $3bn.

The proposal would convert about half of EMPG’s $5bn in first lien debt and all of the $2bn second lien loans to equity, according to two people familiar with its terms. Second lien lenders have yet to approve terms which could give first lien lenders about 90 per cent of the equity.

Irish Independent – 1- :

EMPG’s €350m R&D centre in Dublin, announced to huge fanfare by Tanaiste Mary Coughlan in September 2008, will not be affected as the publishing giant restructures it finances, the company insisted last night.

It is understood that 200 people work in the Dublin city centre office, with plans to hike the overall figure to 450 over the next four years.

“The R&D centre is not affected by the refinancing,” said one source. “In fact, the project is currently delivering ahead of schedule.”

Irish Independent – 2-:

EMPG has been moving closer and closer to the edge of painful restructuring for some time. Headroom on its loan covenants has been getting tighter.

It is understood the company was in danger of missing a bond payment this week, but forbearance has been extended by its creditors until the end of the month.

This should give the company some badly needed breathing space in order to get a deal over the line.

The Irish Times:

This will change the shareholder structure and could leave Irish private investors, who between them currently control 5.5 per cent of EMPG, owning little or nothing of the business.

The Irish investors have put more than $475 million into the company in the past four years through Dublin-based stockbroker Davy. An informed source said yesterday that the investors would be left with a “minimal” stake.

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt parent company Education and Media Publishing Group (EMPG) is in discussions about a financial restructuring that could see the business taken over by its bankers, according to reports from Ireland.

In August last year the company restructured in order to reduce its $7bn (£4.3m) in debts, a move that saw its founder Barry O’Callaghan’s equity stake diluted.

Wall Street Journal (Reg Required):

Irish-American educational software publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Co.’s U.S.-based holding company said Wednesday it will undergo a “comprehensive balance sheet restructuring.”

The holding company–the U.S.-based Education Media & Publishing Group–said: “We and our financial and legal advisors are in advanced discussions with the company’s debt holders regarding potential alternatives that would result in a comprehensive balance sheet restructuring to put the company on a stronger financial footing.”

Publisher Lunch – 1 - (Reg Required):

Two debt restructurings last year still left Houghton Mifflin Harcourt parent company Education and Media Publishing Group (EMPG) straining to sustain their debt obligations and covenants, and reports from Ireland indicate yet another restructuring is in the works that would wipe out equity-holders entirely and turn the company over to its secured lenders.

Publisher Lunch – 2 - (Reg Required):

“Moreover, certain of our lenders have committed to make substantial new investments in the company in connection with this restructuring. Significantly, the plan will enhance liquidity and the company expects to have over $600M of new working capital to support growth initiatives.”

The Irish Independent:

Education Media & Publishing Group, the parent company of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, said it is in discussions with its debt holders aimed at a “comprehensive” financial restructuring.

EMPG is holding talks to put it on a “stronger financial footing,” it said today in an e-mailed statement.

“These developments have no adverse effect on our day-to- day operations, on our employees, or on the nature and quality of the services we provide to our customers and business partners,” it said in the statement.