Apps Based on Children's Books Prove Fertile Marketplace
Michel Kripalani, founder and president of Oceanhouse Media, offered his thoughts to Book Business Extra on the opportunities that mobile apps provide book publishers, as well as why children's books will be keeping his company busy.
Book Business Extra: How do the partnerships you've created with publishers work? Do you buy the rights to the books? Do the publishers get a piece of the apps that sell?
Michel Kripalani: All of our deals are revenue-share based. OM licenses the source content, adapts it to iPhone/iPad, publishes [it] and then pays royalties (i.e., license fees). OM absorbs 100 percent of the production costs and is responsible for all aspects of publishing, including PR, marketing, software updates, customer support, etc. Each of our apps will generally receive three to four updates per year. When Apple releases new hardware, the updates can be substantial, such as the recent iPad and iPhone 4 updates.
- Companies:
- Apple
- Chronicle Books
- Hay House
- People:
- Michel Kripalani