HCP Press Releases
April 5, 2005
HCP Completes Acquisition of Eastern Research Services, Inc.
CHICAGO - (BUSINESS WIRE) - April 5, 2005 - HCP & Company (“HCP”) announced today that it has completed the acquisition of a controlling interest in Eastern Research Services, Inc., a leading independent market research firm. The terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
HCP’s investment will enable the company to expand its bilingual language-of-choice services, enhance its call center operations, as well as solidify its working capital structure. HCP will work with company management to help position Eastern Research Services, and its affiliate company Bilingual Research Services, as the leading, full-service market research firm, in both the general and Hispanic markets, offering premium research services along with its reputable, high-quality telephone data collection services.
Victor Maruri, a Partner at HCP, noted, “We are excited about our partnership with Eastern. The company’s operating infrastructure provides management with an ideal platform to further develop their research products targeted to the Hispanic market.”
“ERS’ leading bilingual research service offers its customers with a high-end solution that improves their marketing strategies focused on the fast-growing Hispanic consumers,” says Carlos Signoret, also a Partner at HCP. “HCP’s capital and sector knowledge will help the company to significantly improve this service and capitalize from strong demographic backwind.”
Over the last 12 years, Eastern Research Services transformed itself from a small, manual dial telephone data collection firm into one of the largest U.S. independent, technically-advanced and customer responsive market research companies, dedicated exclusively to telephone data collection. Three marketing research professionals with over 69 years of experience founded eastern Research Services in 1992: Mike Marcus, Nicholas Mannino, and Kean Spencer. Mannino and Spencer will remain active in the company on a full-time basis, in their current roles as CEO and President, respectively.
Nicholas Mannino, who remains as Chief Executive Officer, stated, “HCP contributes a wealth of insight in the Hispanic marketplace along with expertise in money management and profit enhancement. Eastern Research Services, Inc. is now well positioned to take advantage of the explosive growth in the bilingual population of the United States. Everyone affiliated with Eastern Research Services is excited about the exceptional opportunity this acquisition affords our company.”
Kean Spencer, remaining as President, stated, “The rapidly growing Hispanic population has captured the attention of every sector of the business community. Market research among the Latino population is vital for positioning of products and services. This has created an unprecedented demand for the bilingual language of choice services provided by our company. HCP will provide us with the knowledge necessary to maximize our penetration of this marketplace.”