Penton Media Announces Appointment of William O'Conor to Post of Vice President, Financial Services Group

NEW YORK, Sept. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- Sharon Rowlands, CEO of Penton Media, announced today the appointment of William O'Conor to the newly created post of vice president, financial services group.  Mr. O'Conor, who was most recently vice president and managing director of the Wealth Market Segment of Dow Jones Group, will take on responsibility for Penton's wealth management and commercial real estate media assets.

"Bill is a great creative business leader who I worked with closely when I was CEO of Thomson Financial and Bill was a managing director working on broker advisory services," said Ms. Rowlands.  "At Penton, we have some very fine assets and will be looking to Bill and his team to build the digital, custom, data and research aspects of these businesses plus look for new growth opportunities internally and externally to build Penton's presence.  Wealth Management, in particular, is one of our greatest opportunities."  The group includes Registered Rep, Trusts & Estates, National Real Estate Investor, Lodging Hospitality and Retail Traffic.  Mr. O'Conor will report to Warren Bimblick, senior vice president, strategy and business development.

Mr. O'Conor has spent 20 years in the financial information services segment.  Prior to joining Penton he was vice president and managing director of the Wealth Market Segment of the Dow Jones Group responsible for global strategy, products and sales development.  He was also senior vice president, general manager for Generate Inc., a social networking data and technology company delivering business intelligence services that was acquired by Dow Jones in 2008.  Prior to Dow Jones, he was Managing Director at Thomson Financial where he helped create through product development, integration of existing assets, and acquisition the Thomson Financial Wealth Management practice.  He was also CEO of the Thomson Financial Solutions Group, an industry leader providing the B2B and B2C communities with indispensable web and wireless-enabled financial content, tools, consulting, data integration and web publishing services.  He is a graduate of Georgetown University in Washington, DC.

"Penton has some of the most respected brands in the industry and I look forward to this new challenge of building Penton into a financial services media powerhouse," said Mr. O'Conor.  

About Penton Media

As a leading, independent, business-to-business media company, Penton knows business and how to create and disseminate the vital content that moves markets. Penton is where professionals turn to gain the critical insight, expert analysis, and relevant connections needed to compete and succeed. Headquartered in New York City, the privately held company is owned by MidOcean Partners and U.S. Equity Partners II, an investment fund sponsored by Wasserstein & Co., LP, and its co-investors. For additional information on the company and its businesses, visit www.penton.com.

SOURCE Penton Media