Pearson Company

Publishers of all sizes have to manage detailed and vital information about the rights they own, the rights they have sold, and the royalties they either owe or are owed. It can be a significant accounting undertaking. Especially with the burgeoning digital marketplace, book publishers are increasingly redistributing their content in any number of ways and thus, generating additional revenue––as well as the need to manage additional rights and royalties. Fortunately, there are a number of solutions on the market today, from services that help publishers license their content to those that help automate the tracking and payments process to save time and

Pearson, an international education, business-information and consumer publishing company, with headquarters in London and New York, has agreed to purchase eCollege, which the company calls a leader in the fast-growing U.S. online distance-learning market. Founded in 1996, eCollege works with partner educational institutions to design, build and support online degree, certificate, diploma and professional-development programs. It offers a full range of on-demand software services including virtual campuses, course management and assessment, retention-monitoring tools and reporting. The net cost to Pearson will be $477 million. “eCollege will make Pearson an even stronger education company,” says Marjorie Scardino, Pearson’s chief executive. “It has been a

The hot-button issues in the book industry today surround an increased focus on content and alternative forms of distribution. Publishers are still keeping a watchful eye on the Internet and the fear that it may replace the print-based distribution business in the future. But there appears to be a greater acceptance and realization that “content” is a publisher’s real asset, and that the delivery method means nothing if the content isn’t outstanding. An increased focus on content, book search tools, digital distribution, a declining print readership, increased used-book sales, rising fuel and paper costs, and decreasing bookshelf space in retail superstores are all

In an industry where the time it takes to produce a book is quickly becoming a liability, one media company has found a way around the time crunch. Safari Books—which is jointly owned by O’Reilly Media and Pearson Technology Group—announced on Tuesday the launch of Short Cuts, a new subscription feature to its Web site that puts information into the hands of readers before an entire printed book is even completed. Designed with emerging technology subjects in mind, the company said the move was one that “would help move their service beyond books.” “We are committed to providing content that is timely and appropriate for our

It’s more important than ever to get books to the market fast. More days in production can mean fewer days on the market and fewer sales. For many publishers, especially those producing many titles simultaneously, good production scheduling tools are essential in keeping projects easily trackable, on schedule and problem-free. Here, Book Business takes a look at some of the industry’s leading software providers and the software on the market to help you with the complex task of production scheduling. AEC Software Product: FastTrack Schedule 9 Description: Colorful timelines and calendars are designed to illustrate project deadlines, status and goals. Production details are centralized, aiming to control your

Despite economic concerns highlighted by a slowdown in the housing market, merger and acquisition activity in the media and information industry remained steady through the first three quarters of 2006. Book publishers in the directory, reference, educational, professional and consumer books sectors have been especially busy, according to M&A firm The Jordan Edmiston Group Inc. (JEGI), recording 30 transactions through September of this year. For publishers looking to acquire other companies or positions themselves to be bought out, Book Business sought advice from several M&A advisers on maximizing the value of your next transaction. Tips for Sellers “There are several factors that drive

Content is still king in book publishing. The challenge to publishers today is to move, manage, exchange and manipulate that content in the most efficient and profitable ways. In the age of new media, publishers must be able to accept content from external sources, traffic it through all the pre-publishing phases and then be agile in the way they output it, so that it’s cost-effective but also meaningful to readers. As with any new technology, publishers should evaluate software solutions with these basic considerations in mind: Functionality: What solutions out there have the types of capabilities your company needs? Once the field has

As professors begin creating their course plan for the year, often they’ll select a title that they once used during their days as an undergrad or graduate student, not realizing that the title has been pulled from the backlist of the publisher as ‘out of print.’ The advent of short-run digital technology has allowed publishers to offer books that are no longer in print in quantities anywhere from one to a few thousand. The technology in recent years also has opened up custom publishing divisions at major educational publishers. Pearson Education is one of several large educational book publishers to offer such a

Is it time to take another look at Hi-Fi printing? Hi-Fi is any printing technology that delivers a higher-quality product than the normal four-color process. This is usually done with custom ink applications of five, six, seven or even eight-color Hi-Fi ink sets that deliver a wider range of colors than the standard CYMK process. Hi-Fi breaks the color barrier and achieves far superior brightness levels. Ten years ago it was touted as the next great innovation in high-quality printing. The flexography market has done well with it for the packaging industry, but it somewhat fizzled in the publishing industry. However, a devoted group

Most publishers are relatively tone deaf to adversarial activist campaigns. And so far, large, mainstream publishers have been only lukewarm in their response to voluntary multi-stakeholder collations like the Green Press Initiative/EPA Resource Conservation Challenge, which is calling on publishers to improve their ecological footprint. But, it will be increasingly difficult to ignore the growing number of institutional investors that are calling for big business to address the sustainability challenge. Socially responsible investment funds and indexes that employ sustainability performance ratings now represent in excess of $2 trillion in holdings. The influence of these funds is rising as they are rapidly moving from