Year for Broken Records

R.R. Donnelley & Sons, North America's largest printer, has shown little interest in domestic acquisitions recently, but in 1998 Donnelley looked to international markets, acquiring Ediciones Eclipse, S.A. de C.V., Mexico's largest printer of retail inserts.

Donnelley also spent the year shedding some of its bulk. Its trouble-plagued Metromail was sold, after a heated bidding war, to Britain's Great Universal Stores (GUS). And New York-based Bowne & Co. purchased Donnelley's Enterprise Solutions.