The Railway Industry Association has signed an agreement with Rail Business Daily to acquire most of its assets.

A transition period is expected to take three months, as RIA becomes the publisher of the Rail Business Daily titles and the employer of some RBD staff.

Rail Business Daily will continue to offer marketing and recruitment services, although these will be rebranded.

RIA chief executive Darren Caplan said: ‘We at the Railway Industry Association are excited to be acquiring the widely-read RBD Daily newsletter and Rail Director magazine, and the RBD Community. The acquisitions will enable RIA to grow its reach and augment our ability to do even more to help develop a bigger and better UK rail supply sector in the coming years.

‘As part of the acquisition we are delighted to welcome into the RIA family Dean Bruce as md of the newly-acquired assets, along with other talented members of the RBD media and Community teams. All of us in Team RIA look forward to working with and integrating with them in the months ahead.’

RBD chairman David McLoughlin added: ‘We would like to thank Darren Caplan and chairman David Tonkin for their pragmatism and professionalism in working with us on this deal and we wish RIA and RBD every success together in the future.’