Wiley Aims For Intelligent Digital Content

The digital revolution has arguably transformed higher education more dramatically than any other publishing sector. The interactive features that may seem like a distraction in a novel perform crucial functions in education products, enhancing the learning experience with instructional video or in-ebook math problems. Adaptive learning and interconnected content are also becoming more important, says Sesha Bolisetty, vice president of content management at Wiley Global Education.

Joining John Wiley & Sons in July of 2012 in the midst of its digital transformation, Bolisetty was tasked with streamlining production in the global education division. This required improving workflows, strengthening digital platforms, and increasing overall digital output.

Bolisetty’s work is also part of a growing trend in the education sector to provide services, or as Bolisetty puts it, “content-enabled products.” Just two months after he joined Wiley, the company acquired Deltak, an online learning platform that hosts courses for hundreds of institutions. The acquisition will power Wiley’s efforts to provide e-learning solutions for universities and enhance its own online education platform WileyPlus.

Book Business spoke with Bolisetty to learn how Wiley Global Education has developed under his leadership and to discuss the future of the education publishing sector.

What has changed in the education division since you were hired two years ago?

I would say in the last two years we made tremendous strides in strengthening our digital portfolio, our platforms, and also the scale of our digital revenue. Now more than half of our revenue comes from digital products and services. That's a big change that is taking place.

A significant part of our effort goes into building enhanced ebooks, rich media, and the adaptive content that we produce. In other words, it's not just about digital content, it is also about making the content more adaptive to the customer needs and enriching content with various functionalities. Those are some of the big things that are going on.