Bloomberg BNA

Early history (1929-2011)

The Bureau of National Affairs, Inc. (BNA) was founded in 1929 by newsman David Lawrence as a subsidiary of United States Daily, now known as the US News & World Report. BNA's first publication was U.S. Patent, Trademark & Copyright Reports (now United States Patent Quarterly). In 1946, Lawrence sold BNA to five of his top editors: Dean Dinwoodey, John D. Stewart, Ed Donnell, Adolph Magidson and John Tyler. The editors opened up ownership to the rest of their BNA colleagues and from 1947 until 2011, the company was owned entirely by current and former employees.

Tax Management, Inc., a subsidiary of Bloomberg BNA, was founded in 1959 by Leonard Silverstein to provide tax analysis in the form of the Tax Management Portfolios. The company has published over 500 Portfolios and now offers research, news, practice tools, and guidance for tax attorneys, CPAs, corporate tax managers, estate planners, and financial accountants. It offers federal, state, international tax and accounting services. Tax Management, Inc., is fully integrated into Bloomberg BNA and is based in Arlington, Virginia.

Recent history (2011-Present)

On August 25, 2011, Bloomberg L.P announced it would purchase BNA for an estimated $990 million. The transaction closed in late September 2011 at which time Bloomberg paid $39.50 a share in cash through a tender offer to BNA's employee-owners. Bloomberg purchased BNA to bolster its existing Bloomberg Government, Bloomberg Law and Bloomberg News services and integrated BNA's vast databases and deep reporting of policy into its news and online products.

Timeline

1926 - Publisher David Lawrence launches United States Daily.

1929 - U.S. Patent, Trademark & Copyright Reports; BNA’s first publication launched March 4 (today called United States Patents Quarterly).

1933 - United States Daily folds in the aftermath of President Franklin Roosevelt’s "bank holiday;" converts into a weekly. The United States News - Law Journal launched (later changed to U.S. Law Week).

1941 - Daily Report on Price and Production Controls begins in April; it is the only privately produced publication to receive an unlimited allocation of paper during World War II.

1957 - The National Labor Relations Board certifies the American Newspaper Guild as the bargaining agent for BNA employees (BNA employees are now covered by the Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild).

2007 - BNA moves corporate headquarters from the West End of Washington, DC to Arlington, Virginia.

2011 - Bloomberg L.P. announces intent to purchase BNA for an estimated $990 million.

2013 - Bloomberg L.P. announces appointment of Darren McKewen as President of Bloomberg BNA.

2016 - Bloomberg BNA announces appointment of Dan Fine as Chief Operating Officer (COO).

Products and services

Bloomberg BNA produces more than 350 news publications in a broad array of topics. The company offers solutions to practitioners in the areas of law, tax and accounting, human resources and payroll, and environment, health and safety. The company's network of more than 2,500 reporters, correspondents, and leading practitioners performed practical analysis, news, practice tools, and guidance. Information compiled by Bloomberg BNA's editors and reporters is available to Bloomberg Government and Bloomberg Law subscribers.

Legal and Bloomberg Law

Bloomberg Law is a subscription-based product for online legal research. The platform, which Bloomberg L.P. introduced in 2009, provides legal content, proprietary company information and news information to attorneys, law students, and other legal professionals. The service integrates Bloomberg L.P. news with Bloomberg BNA's primary and secondary legal content and business development tools, as well as tools to analyze case law, corporate representation, and judicial history. Features include Litigation and Dockets, Legal and Financial Analytics, Business Development Center, Practice Tools and News and Law Reports. In 2014, Bloomberg Law moved under the umbrella of Bloomberg BNA.

Tax, Accounting and Payroll

Bloomberg BNA provides tax guidance resources to accounting, corporate and legal professionals that specialize in tax planning and compliance. As part of many of its tax and accounting research products, Bloomberg BNA offers more than 500 ‘’Tax Management Portfolios’’ written by outside practitioners on key tax planning, transactional, jurisdictional or financial accounting issues. Each Portfolio includes an analysis of the alternative approaches to a certain issue, worksheets and practice tools section, sample forms, primary sources and a bibliography.

Bloomberg BNA serves the professional payroll marketplace through products like the Payroll Decision Support Network and the Payroll Library. These products provide news, white papers, customized research answers, along with webinars and research reports.

Environment, Health and Safety

Bloomberg BNA offers products to environment, health and safety professionals to help them with compliance and issues related to safety and liability. These products feature compliance tools, news and analysis, and databases of relevant federal and state laws, regulations, and documents.

Corporate citizenship and awards

BNA provides support to a variety of charities and community organizations. They support the Legal Aid Society of the District of Columbia by offering complimentary access to Bloomberg Law. Michael Bloomberg, the founder of Bloomberg BNA’s parent company formed the charitable foundation Bloomberg Philanthropies in 2006. According to organization’s mission statement, Bloomberg Philanthropies focuses on public health, environment, education, government innovation and the arts.

Notable products and publications