South Africa

Toronto, ON - July 6, 2015 - Wattpad, the world's largest community of readers and writers, and Harlequin, one of the world's most recognizable names in romance, have teamed up for the 2015 So You Think You Can Write (SYTYCW) contest. For the first time ever, the annual romance writing competition has launched on Wattpad, with writers around the world able to submit their manuscript on Wattpad for a chance to win a two-book publishing deal with Harlequin.

Pearson has become the latest blue-chip company to increase its venture investments, committing $50m to education start-ups in Africa and Asia.

The world's largest education company by revenues, which owns the Financial Times, is expanding a fund it set up in 2012 with $15m to invest in companies focused on improving low-cost private education.

Many media and telecoms groups, including Sky, the pay-television company, and publisher Reed Elsevier, are opting for venture investments in an attempt to increase innovation and growth. Bertelsmann, the family-owned German media group, has committed at least $100m to education start-ups.

The hotly debated topic "The future of eBooks: the impact of the digital eBook phenomenon" will be the key focus at this year's South African Book Fair, where the impact of eBooks in the South African education system will come under the spotlight.

Riaan Jonck, CEO of Pearson South Africa, a leading supplier of educational materials and technologies to the student and educator market (and a main exhibitor at this year's Fair) believes that for the next five years print

Penguin Random House has completed the purchase of South Africa-based Random House Struik.

Random House Struik was formed in 2008 following the merger of Random House South Africa and Struik Publishers. Times Media Group's New Holland Publishing held a 50.1% stake in the company, while The Random House Group owned 49.9%.

Following a deal completed on Friday (13th December) Penguin Random House now takes 100% ownership of the company.

I have been studying e-publishing in developing countries since 2009, when Ramy Habeeb (Egypt), Arthur Attwell (South Africa), and I set up the Digital Minds Network to informally exchange data. As digital publishers in the Global South, we didn't feel that the US and European business models fully met our needs. Then, in 2011, the International Alliance of Independent Publishers and the Prince Claus Fund asked me to do a detailed study of the digital phenomenon in Latin America, Africa, the Arab World, Russia, India and China.

Lagardére, parent company of book publisher Hachette, and Bertelsmann, parent company of book publisher Random House, both announced financial results for the first six months of 2013. Of the two, Lagardère provided more detail on digital results: Digital made up 11.3 percent of Lagardère Publishing’s net sales worldwide, compared to 8.4 percent a year ago. Ebooks now account for 34 percent of adult trade book sales in the U.S., compared to 27 percent last year, and 31 percent in the U.K., up from 22 percent last year.