Forbes refers to the legendary American business magazine started a century ago. The high level advice magazine beloved by high net worth and ultra-high net worth individuals and business executives has been published bi-weekly all this time. It includes significant and well-regarded articles on industry, finance, marketing, and investing. They also do reports on relevant finance- and investment-related topics including communications, technology, politics, economics, science, and law.
Their headquarters is found in Jersey City, New Jersey in the U.S. The main rivals in this space of national business magazines includes such heavy weights as Bloomberg Business Week, and Fortune Magazine. The Forbes magazine is famed for its internationally acclaimed rankings and lists, such as the Forbes 400 wealthiest Americans list and the Forbes Global 2000 largest companies in the world. They also produce the household list of the World’s Billionaires.
The magazine has a motto which is “The Capitalist Tool.” The editor in chief and chairman remains a family man and grandson of the founder, Steve Forbes. Mike Perlis is the Chief Executive Officer. On July 18th of 2014, the announcement came out that the majority stake in the legendary publisher had already been sold to an investment group located in Hong Kong known by their name of Integrated Whale Media Investments.
The publication company originally became founded by B.C. Forbes. He turned out to be a Hearst Papers financial columnist. He and his partner Walter Drey who was general manager for The Magazine of Wall Street established this new magazine back on September 15th of 1917. B.C. put up the money and came up with the name while Drey delivered the needed expertise in publishing. Originally the magazine was named Forbes: Devoted to Doers and Doings. Drey was made the vice president of the B.C. Forbes Publishing Company and B.C. himself was editor in chief, a post he determinedly manned until he finally died in 1954.
B.C. was helped in his failing years by his two oldest sons Malcom Stevenson (died 1990) and Bruce Charles (died 1964). Upon his father’s eventual death, it was Bruce who assumed command of the publication company. His considerable talents were in the areas of improving marketing for the publication and in streamlining its then-far flung operations. In only the ten years during which he headed the organization, the circulation of the magazine approximately doubled throughout the United States and world.
Upon the death of Malcom, his oldest son took over. Malcom Stevenson “Steve” Forbes Junior represented the third family generation to own and run the publication. He had the three key roles of Chief Executive Officer and President of the publishing company and was simultaneously the Editor in Chief of Forbes magazine. He employed James Michaels as editor from 1961 to 1999. Michaels helped the magazine to reach a pinnacle of achievement in 1993 when it was a finalist for the National Magazine Award.
Back in 2006, investment group Elevation Partners, most famous for its constituent rock legend Bono of Irish rock band U2, acquired a minority stake in the company as part of a reorganization that led to the company becoming Forbes Media LLC which represented a merger of Forbes.com, Forbes magazine and their various other media property holdings. The New York Times report which investigated this sale stated in 2009 that 40 percent of the business had been sold for $300 million, which valued the company at an impressive $750 million.
Besides Forbes magazine and the lifestyle supplemental publication Forbes Life, the company has other titles it produces. Among these are fifteen local area language editions including Forbes Asia. Steve and his staff writers provide weekly investment advice on a Fox TV weekly show called Forbes on Fox and Forbes on Radio. They also own additional separate companies like Forbes Investment Advisory Group, Forbes Conference Group, and Forbes Custom Media. Steve’s daughter Moira publishes ForbesWoman and an accompanying companion online edition. Since 2009, the company has produced the popular Forbes Travel Guide.