The Deal, which is backed by the Wasserstein Family Trust, finally finds a buyer in TheStreet.

Wasserstein & Co. has acquired High Pressure Equipment Co. The sellers are the James family who will retain an ownership interest. Financial terms weren’t announced. Erie, Pa.-based High pressure makes specialty valves for high pressure applications. PRESS RELEASE Wasserstein & Co., on behalf of its private equity investment fund Wasserstein Partners III, has acquired High [...]

Penton Media, a business to business media company providing content, insight and marketing to 17 industry sectors, has appointed David Kieselstein, previously CEO of TNS North America, as Penton Media CEO. He will also join the Penton board of directors. Kieselstein will be based in New York. Penton is owned by MidOcean Partners and US [...]

US based digital media services provider Encompass Digital Media has entered into a definitive agreement with private equity firm Court Square Capital Partners under which funds managed by Court Square will acquire a majority interest in the company from selling shareholders including Wasserstein & Co. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. PRESS RELEASE [...]

Kevin Michielsen was named Senior VP of information and research solutions of ALM, which is backed by Wasserstein & Co. Michielsen was also named chief strategy officer for ALM.

Last week, W. Townsend Ziebold jumped to First Beverage Group, a boutique financial services firm catering to the beverage industry. He joined First Beverage from Bruce Wasserstein’s PE firm, Wasserstein & Co.

Townsend has over 25 years in investment banking and private equity. He’s been a banker with First Boston Corp. and Wasserstein Perella, which was acquired by Dresdner Bank in 2000 (The merchant bank of WP was spun off in 2000 to form Wasserstein & Co.). Townsend has worked on some major deals, including KKR’s purchase of RJR Nabisco and SmithKline’s merger with the Beecham Group. At Wasserstein & Co., he worked on the buys of IMAX Corp., Maybelline Cosmetics and Turtle Mountain, a leading producer of non-dairy desserts.

Townsend, 49, officially joined First Beverage on May 9. I spoke to him by phone last week.

Penton Media, which is backed by MidOcean Partners and Wasserstein & Co., has appointed Nicola Allais as executive vice president and CFO. Allais replaces Jen Clifton who left in August. Penton, of New York, is a business-to-business media company.