St. Martin’s Press is reorganizing its marketing and publicity departments into four core groups as part of a move from “format-driven orientation to an audience-and-category-focused orientation.” The groups will be made up of SMP’s current marketers, publicists and digital marketers, each working on a specific set of genre groups. Anne Marie Tallberg has been named vp, marketing, communications & audience development leading a group focusing on women’s fiction/romance/young adult/parenting/self-help/health-fitness-diet/crafts. Dori Weintraub will serve in the same executive capacity, leading a group focusing on women’s fiction/literary fiction/biography-memoir. Lisa Senz will has been named vp, marketing and partnerships, and will continue as […]
Publisher services
People: Firebrand Acquires Tallent’s eBook Architects, and More
Firebrand Technologies has acquired eBook Architects, the ebook design and production company founded by Joshua Tallent. eBook Architects will continue business as usual from their Austin, TX office, serving their existing customers as well as helping Firebrand to build an “end-to-end service.” Firebrand ceo Fran Toolan says in the announcement, “Working as partners over the last few years, we’ve seen that quality and customer service are the first priorities for Joshua and his team, as they are for ours. Bringing design expertise in-house allows us to fully serve our current and future customers, and furthers our mission of providing services at […]
eNews: McGraw-Hill’s eTextbooks Adapt to Students; BabyFirst Digital Imprint; PIA Awards; and More
At the Consumer Electronics Show, McGraw-Hill has announced an “adaptive e-book” for college texts, which “focuses students’ attention on the content that is most critical to their learning.” They will launch in the late spring for about 90 course areas. As the WSJ describes it: “All readers essentially see the same textbook as they read for the first five minutes. But as a reader answers review questions placed throughout the chapter, different passages become highlighted to point the reader to where he or she should focus attention.” A company called Area9 developed the technology. Though digital textbooks have lagged so far, McGraw-Hill […]
Open Road Pairs with Ingram to Offer Full-Service Digital and POD Distribution
Starting in January, Open Road will offer a broad digital distribution service to individual authors, agents “with large catalogs of backlist books, and independent publishers who need help digitizing, formatting, and distributing their content digitally, putting them in direct competition with such players as Constellation and INScribe Digital. Open Road’s service is “powered by Ingram Content Group,” using the CoreSource platform for broad digital distribution and Lightning Source and Ingram Publisher Services for print-on-demand production and distribution. (Open Road has already been working with Ingram for manufacturing and distribution of their print titles). Open Road founder Jane Friedman says they […]
eNews: Hachette Commits to EPUB3; Fictionwise Will Shut Down on December 4
Long on-the-verge EPUB3 may finally land. Hachette Book Group underscored their commitment to new standard and the enhanced content it supports, announcing that they will release 16 titles in EPUB3 between this November and next March. Beginning with titles across a variety of nonfiction genres and children’s books, they plan to “publish all standard novels in EPUB3 by March 2013” as well. The news had been widely expected ever since Barnes & Noble bought the company in 2009, prior to launching the first iteration of the Nook, but Fictionwise will officially shut down on December 4, according to an email […]
Corporate: Swann Steps Down as CEO of WHSmith; Final Suitors for McGraw-Hill Education;HarperCollins Moves to Streamline Global Publishing Infrastructure; and More
Kate Swann will step down as ceo of WHSmith on June 30 after more than nine years, the company announced Thursday. She will be replaced by current managing director of Smith’s high street business Steve Clarke. “It is an opportune time to make a change of leadership, and I am sure that the company will continue to thrive under Steve,” Swann told the FT. She didn’t elaborate further on future plans but said she “certainly doesn’t intend to retire.” The news was announced in tandem with the release of WHSmith’s preliminary full-year results, in which pre-tax profits rose 9.7 percent […]