Pearson Finds Language Gap With Unit Sale

The FTSE-100 education and publishing group Pearson (Xetra: 858266 - news) is hoisting a "for sale" sign over a division it bought less than four years ago as it wrestles with growing pressure on global sales.

Sky News understands that Pearson is exploring a disposal of GlobalEnglish Corp, which uses cloud software to teach English to employees of multinational companies.

The decision to offload the business comes as part of a wider strategic overhaul being implemented by John Fallon, Pearson's chief executive, who has been under growing pressure from the City after a string of profit warnings.

Pearson bought GlobalEnglish in 2012 when the company was run by Mr Fallon's predecessor, Dame Marjorie Scardino.

At the time of the acquisition, GlobalEnglish counted companies including GE and Unilever (NYSE: UL - news) among its clients.

It (Other OTC: ITGL - news) is unclear why Pearson has now decided to sell the business, for which it paid $90m, but sources suggested that Mr Fallon had decided that it was not core to its turnaround efforts.

The news comes just two days before Pearson holds its annual shareholder meeting and updates the City on first-quarter trading.

Mr Fallon is also expected to disclose the extent of progress it has made since outlining a series of cost-cutting and other targets last year.

Under him, Pearson has sold its two most prominent assets: its stake in The Economist Group and the Financial Times newspaper.

Although the company attracted rich prices for those businesses, Mr Fallon is under pressure because of a slowdown in its US education business.

Pearson is also an investor in Penguin Random House (PRH), the global books publisher.

Sky News revealed this month that PRH is itself examining a sale of Dorling Kindersley, which publishes well-known book series on Star Wars and Harry Potter.

Pearson declined to comment.