After announcing $6 million in seed funding last September, BookClub has now raised a $20 million Series A financing. The round was led by Signal Peak Ventures — which was joined by GSV Ventures, Maveron, Backstage Capital and Pelion Venture Partner, along with MasterClass co-founded Aaron Rasmussen and Goodreads co-founder Otis Chandler. The service has […]
eNews
Back to the Future: Kobo Launches Writeable eReader
If you remember the Newton and the early days of dedicated ereaders, Kobo’s new product announcement is a trip down memory lane. Their Elipsa reader, launching June 24 is oversized — a 10.3-inch screen — and writeable. It comes with a stylus and lets you annotate ebooks and PDFs (depending on the DRM permissions). You […]
Amazon Publishing Reaches Library Deal
Amazon Publishing will finally make their titles available for lending to library patrons in the US, working with the non-profit Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) and the SimplyE ereader app created by the New York Public Library. Starting this summer, and applying to their full catalog of approximately 10,000 ebooks and audiobooks, Amazon Publishing […]
Korea’s Kakao Buys Out Radish and Tapas Media as Naver Closes Wattpad Acquisition
South Korean’s Kakao Entertainment is buying serialized fiction app Radish for $440 million and web comics platform Tapas Media for $510 million. The purchases expand on Kakao’s popular webtoons business, currently focused on Korea and Japan. Kakao was already a minority investor in both companies — reported to own about 13 percent of Radish after […]
Ingram Sells VitalSource to Private Equity Firm
Ingram Content Group has an agreement to sell their etextbook platform VitalSource Technologies to Francisco Partners, an investment firm focused on technology businesses. The acquirer says in the announcement it is, “Committed to furthering the VitalSource mission of improving learner outcomes and accelerating our commitment to developing innovative, forward-thinking solutions and platforms that open doors […]
People, Etc.
Shelley Husband has joined the Association of American Publishers as senior vice president, government affairs and special projects. Most recently she was staff director and general counsel for the House Committee on the Judiciary from 2013 to 2019. At Hachette Livre, Nathalie Houël has been promoted to group chief financial officer. Arnaud Robert becomes group secretary […]