New Zealand’s Commerce Commission announced Tuesday that they, too, have approved the pending Penguin Random House merger, following on the approvals by the DOJ in February and Australia’s commerce commission earlier this month. In their decision, which arrived a couple of weeks in advance of their April 5 deadline, Commission chairman Mark Berry said in a statement said they “looked at the potential impact of the merger in the markets for book publishing rights, printed book distribution services provided to third party publishers and the wholesale of books” and considered that “in each of the relevant markets, the merged [Penguin […]
Archives for March 2013
Supreme Court Rules Against Wiley In Overseas First Sale Case
In 6–3 decision, the Supreme Court overturned a lower court decision and sided with the defendant in John Wiley’s case against Supap Kirtsaeng, trying to block his resale inside the US of textbooks produced and sold overseas in less expensive editions. The high court agreed with Kirtsaeng that the first sale doctrine applies, even to goods produced overseas. Other content-focused industries had joined publishers in support for Wiley’s case. In the dissent, Justices Kennedy, Scalia and Ginsburg expressed concern that the Court was ignoring Congress’ intention of protecting “copyright owners against the unauthorized importation of low-priced, foreign-made copies of their copyrighted works.” Justice […]
New Imprints: Jonathan Cape Children’s Revives Fiction Publishing; Penguin Australia Unveils Young Readers Program
Jonathan Cape Children‘s, which has been publishing new picture books and backlist titles by Roald Dahl and Joan Aiken, will now publish new fiction, led Random House Children’s UK publisher Annie Eaton. In a statement she said she would acquire “some very special future children’s classics.” RHCP m.d. Philippa Dickinson added: “Annie has an enviable track record for publishing established literary greats as well as debut fiction. She has a knack for seeking out new names, and nurturing them to become commercial and award winning successes, as can be seen with Wonder by R J Palacio and Itch by Simon […]
Corporate: Lonely Planet Sale to NC2 Confirmed; eMusic Merges with Blio
After a vague and weak denial last month when travel site Skift first reported the deal in progress, the BBC has now confirmed its sale of Lonely Planet to little-known billionaire Brad Kelley’s NC2 media. Selling for £51.5 million ($77.3 million), the sale is now raising the expected criticism in the UK as the British public confronts the full fiasco of the broadcaster’s diversion into travel publishing. The BBC already took £50 million in writedowns on the total £130 million purchase price for Lonely Planet, and the sale is an admission that even those writedowns were not sufficient to account […]
Amazon Publishing Will Speed up Author Royalty Payments
In letters to authors and agents sent Monday afternoon Amazon Publishing said it will quicken the pace at which it pays out author royalties, moving from quarterly remittance to monthly payments, issued 60 days after the close of each month. The news was first reported by the WSJ and we’ve also seen a copy of the letter. In it, vp, Amazon Publishing Jeff Belle explains “in this digital age, we don’t see why authors should have to wait six months to be paid.” The new payment procedure will begin with January 2013 royalties, to be paid through on March 31. […]
People, Etc.
Andrew Duncan will join Grand Central on March 25 as associate director, online marketing, reporting to Emi Battaglia. Duncan was most recently senior marketing manager at Viking. Megan Perritt joins Crown as senior publicist. She was previously a publicist at F&W Media. In addition, Rebecca Marsh has been named publicist, moving from Simon & Schuster. In the wake of Mark Suchomel’s abrupt departure earlier this month after more than 15 years as company president, IPG has made a number of changes to its senior management. Jeff Tegge has been promoted to executive vice president, where he will continue to coordinate […]