From Laura Hazard-Owen at paidContent: Random House parent company Bertelsmann and Penguin parent company Pearson announced Thursday that the Department of Justice has approved the proposed merger between Random House and Penguin “without conditions.” The merger, which remains under review by other antitrust authorities including the European Commission and the Canadian Competition Bureau, would create […]
Random House-Penguin Merger Receives Green Light from U.S. Dept. of Justice
Filed by on February 14, 2013
Big Six May Become Big Five—Random House and Penguin in Preliminary Merger Talks
Filed by on October 25, 2012
Pearson is in talks with Bertelsmann to combine Penguin and Random House, the company confirmed. However, “the two companies have not reached agreement and there is no certainty that the discussions will lead to a transaction,” Pearson said in a statement.
Penguin eBook Sales More than Double During 2011, "Not There Yet" With a Library Business Model
Filed by on February 27, 2012
From The Guardian: Pearson has reported a 72% surge in pre-tax profits to £1.15bn for 2011, with ebook sales at Penguin more than doubling and profits at FT Group, home to the Financial Times, up by about a quarter. [Clip] Total revenues across the group, which includes book publisher Penguin and educational holdings, grew 4% […]
OverDrive Tells Library Customers that Sales of Penguin Audiobooks Have Been Suspended
Filed by on January 18, 2012
From a PaidContent Article by Laura Hazard Owen: Hoping to skirt Penguin’s library e-book restrictions by checking out a hot new title as a digital audiobook instead? Sorry, that strategy will no longer work as Penguin changed its library policies again today Digital Shift has the message that OverDrive, which distributes e-books to libraries, sent […]
More Exclusive eBook Content: "Penguin Shorts" Launches
Filed by on December 12, 2011
From The Guardian: The Penguin Shorts progamme, a collection of short digital reads, has just launched with nine titles, ranging from a creepy short story by Dunmore to an essay on multiculturalism from Elif Shafak, accounts of the battles of Alamein and Isandlwana, recipes for the perfect Christmas day from Felicity Cloake and a novella […]
Penguin eBook Titles for Lending via OverDrive Return to Kindle But New Releases Remain Unavail + Penguin Issues Statement
Filed by on November 23, 2011
From the OverDrive Digital Library Blog: ‘Get for Kindle’ for all Penguin eBooks in your catalog has been restored as of this morning. Penguin titles are available for check out by Kindle users and the Kindle format will be available for patrons who are currently on a waiting list for a Penguin title. Upcoming releases […]
Why Might A Publisher Pull Its E-Books From Libraries? by Laura Hazard Owen
Filed by on November 22, 2011
Title: Why Might A Publisher Pull Its E-Books From Libraries? A new article by Laura Hazard Owen on paidContent.org discusses three possibilities. Penguin is mad about Amazon’s deal with OverDrive and is retaliating. Penguin thinks people are checking out e-books from non-local libraries Penguin is worried that e-book checkouts from libraries will cut into sales […]
