Long after Luxembourg and France decided for themselves, the European Court has ruled that it really is ok for individual countries to charge lower Value Added Tax rates on ebooks. Reduced VAT was always allowed on printed books, but the statute never mentioned ebooks — which most countries took to mean that ebooks had to be charged normal, full VAT. Luxembourg was the notable exception, turning it into the server farm for digital media in Europe, and then France joined in more recently. The court came to the clarifying decision in a case brought by Finland over the difference between print […]
International News
Digital Briefs: Kobo In Holland, Public Radio/TV eBook Premiums, and More
Kobo has had a Dutch ebookstore since early 2012, launched in cooperation with local retailer Libris Blz, and now they have partnered with Bol.com, “the largest provider of ebooks in the Netherlands and Belgium.” BookShout has an agreement with premium supplier Forest Incentives that will enable public radio and TV stations to provide ebooks as gifts to their contributing members. Participating publishers include Harper Collins, Macmillan, Simon & Schuster, and Workman. Open Road has published 17 ebooks of poetry by John Ashbery, 87. The NYT looks at how improvements in formatting have overcome the poet’s initial objections to how his […]
People, Etc.
Simon & Schuster Australia managing director Lou Johnson has resigned from the company in order to “seek challenges in her career outside of Simon & Schuster, and potentially beyond the traditional publishing environment,” the company said in the announcement, though she will stay “for the foreseeable future” to ensure a smooth transition as a search for her successor begins. Johnson joined S&S Australia in 2008 and has been managing director for the past four years, during which time responsibility for Australia shifted from the US to Simon & Schuster UK. CEO of S&S UK and International Ian Chapman said: “Lou and her […]
Corporate: Harper eBooks In China, Amazon Expands In London, and Good Books Auction
HarperCollins announced an agreement with JD.com and China National Publications Import and Export (Group) Corporation to sell English-language ebooks in China. It is “the first time the company has made its e-books directly available to consumers in China through a local retailer,” though JD.com has partnered with Harper in selling their print books in China for some time. The initiative will start with approximately 800 backlist titles. Amazon UK will relocate all of their corporate employees to London by next summer, spread across three offices for the time being. Then, as of 2017, they will occupy more than two-thirds of a […]
Corporate: Bloomsbury Adds Conway; Full Fathom Digital; New Rizzoli Bookstore Lease
Bloomsbury has purchased the 200-title naval and military history list of Conway from Pavilion Books in the UK (the rebranded version of Anova). Bloomsbury will integrate the titles into their existing lines. Terms were not disclosed, but the Bookseller notes that Conway publisher John Lee will leave after 20 years in that position. James Frey’s packaging company Full Fathom Five is launching a digital imprint that intends to issue a new ebook every week starting October 1. Mashable, which reports the news, explains (?) FFF will publish “genre e-books that the new imprint believes wouldn’t fit into a traditional publishing model but […]
Hachette UK Creates New International Sales Group
Hachette UK announced the formation of a new international sales group division, to be overseen by Ben Wright, who will join the company in October as international sales director, responsible for international sales of titles published by the Hachette UK group of publishers, as well as titles published by HBG USA and their third-party agency businesses. Wright, who will report to Richard Kitson, is currently director, digital sales and channel development at Penguin Random House UK. Reporting to Wright are international sales managers Sarah Millar (Southern Europe, Turkey and Africa, excluding South Africa); Abigail Mitchell (Scandinavia); Anna Curvis (France, Holland, Belgium […]