The Future of International
Publishing Start-Ups
16 April 2012
London Book Fair 2012
British Council's Young Creative Entrepreneur Publishing
winners present market insights and innovative business
models from China, India, Turkey and South Africa.

James Bridle
Writer, Publisher and Artist
Chairperson
James Bridle is a writer, publisher and artist based in London, UK.
He has founded innovative publishing start-ups and helps
publishers and arts organisations understand new media. At the
moment he's particularly interested in networks, architecture and
digital behaviour. He makes things with words, books and the
internet, and writes about what he does at booktwo.org.

Arthur Attwell
Managing Director and Co-Founder
Electric Book Works
AboutArthur finds innovative ways to deliver publishing solutions in developing countries. Arthur
studied at Cape Town University, where he majored in English Literature and Latin and completed an
MA in Creative Writing. In 1998 he joined Oxford University Press in Cape Town and, in 2002,
Oxford. Upon his return to South Africa he worked as a senior publisher at Maskew Miller Longman,
a Pearson company. In 2005 he left big publishing to start a new venture, which in 2006 became
Electric Book Works, a company specialising in applying innovative technology to traditional
publishing. As managing director of EBW, Arthur has initiated and overseen a range of publishing
projects and research, including services for large and small publishers, the publication of two
acclaimed children's books and of EBW's flagship EBW Healthcare series (, and the development of
Mousehand, EBW's self- and small-scale publishing service, which produces and distributes
books/ebooks locally and internationally for a range of new and established authors. In addition to
his role at EBW, Arthur's current work focuses on research and consulting on print-on-demand and
ebooks, and on developing new ways to deliver content in developing countries. Arthur was one of
the finalists of the YCE Publishing Award 2009.

Gökçesu Tamer
Product Manager
Dogan Kitap
Gökçesu Tamer had an interested and varied career before realising she wanted to work
in publishing. She is currently part of the marketing team at Dogan Kitap. She was born
and raised in Ankara and in 1996 moved to Istanbul to study International Relations at
Bogazici University. In 2002 Gökçesu began her career at Focus popular science
magazine as editor and translator. But, in May 2003 Gökçesu life turned around when she
decided that, for her, 'it was all about books,' and after years of constant reading Gökçesu
became a bookseller. As the Category Manager of Megavizyon Bookstores chain, she's
taken part in 9 store openings and is responsible for the stores from A to Z. After following
this path, Gökçesu realised she wanted to be a part of the publishing world. Now,
Gökçesu is a member of Dogan Kitap marketing team and works on everything from book
selection to launch and the associated marketing activities. Gökçesu is a winner of the
YCE Publishing Award 2012.

Publishing in Transition
New Business Models
From Turkish Book Market
Gökçesu Tamer
16 April 2012

Publishing in Turkey: a quick
glance
• 8000+ active publishers
• 6000 bookstores
• 43,190 new titles published in 2011
• 8 % VAT
• Average price: 10 USD
• Market size: 2.2 billion USD

Going beyond traditional distribution
• Online distribution company
• Provides solutions for small bookstores
• 1360 publishers & 1400 bookstores
• Book data for e-trade

Immigration to digital world
• E-book sales started in April 2010
• By now share of e-books is only 0,38%, but
growing rapidly ( 400% last year)
• ~ 3500 titles converted to e-books
• New applications, new platforms are being
developed.

A Platform for e-Books
• B2C and B2B sales
• Works on «all devices with a screen»
• Compatible with Publishers
Association’s DRM module
• Samsung e-Book application for
Samsung Turkey
• e-Book sales in Migros kiosks (April
2012)

Publishing «with» the readers
DEX is an imprint for young adult books,
targeting 16-25 aged young adults.
•Interactive, trendy and cinematographic
content
•Fantasy, mystery, horror, love and more...
•Effective use of social media: Talking with the
readers rather than talking to them

Social media apps
E-cards with quotes from your
favorite authors
Share your stories with Elif Shafak

Thanks for listening...
gtamer@dogankitap.com.tr
twitter.com/gokcesutamer

Ganesh Ram
Founder & CEO
eMahatva Technologie
Ganesh Ram is the founder of eMahatva Technologie, a start-up committed to developing technologies that
will facilitate publishing in the future. Ganesh hails from a small town called Udumalpet, located near
Coimbatore, known as Manchester of South India. After completing his school education there, he went to
Chennai and did his Bachelors Degree in Commerce. With an ever-glowing interest in Computers and
Information Technology, he learned number of application on his own, and in 2007 along with his friend
Saravanan he started working on innovative mobile applications. Their project was selected under InfoDev –
a World Bank programme – to be developed and supported by the Incubation centre of VIT University, one
of the leading private technology university in India. This led to the creation of Ganesh’s technology start-up,
eMahatva Technologie. The start-up is committed to developing technologies that will facilitate publishing in
the future, especially mobile phones and tablets. Ganesh is keen to make publishing in Indian languages on
these devices easier and more widespread. FUBLISH platform, which stands for 'Futuristic Publishing'
developed by the organization, aims to improve the way knowledge is imparted in the future. Currently the
platform enables Publishers and Authors to take their works to many digital media forms right from basic
phones to tablets. Ganesh is a winner of the YCE Publishing Award 2012.

Hello !
The Future of
International Publishing Start-ups
- Ganesh Ram KR,
Founder & CEO, eMahatva, India

Setting the Stage
“Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day.
Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a
lifetime.”
- Chinese Proverb
PDF, ePUB, Apps, digital questions ???
Fublish :: The Future of Publishing

The Problem / Opportunity
Where is the BIG Opportunity in India ?
Kindle, iPad, Android Tablets...
If this is our perception, is that correct ?
BUT we think otherwise...
What about 800+ million mobile phone users ?
BUT there is problem.
Are local languages displayed on the phones ?
NO in more than 90% its not supported.
Let us try to solve this problem and here is a REAL
OPPORTUNITY

The Solution
We have developed a solution for that.
mvFont Rendering Engine
Works on even basic phones (sub $40 phones) that doesn't
support Indian Language charactersets on them..
Can be used by any developer for their mobile applications..
This is our small contribution to bridge the digital divide

The Business Model
Still, there is another bottleneck. App Delivery.
WALLED GARDENS, PRICING, PAYMENT PROCESSING
TRYING A NEW BUSINESS-MODEL :
“Seed” mobile library is a collection of 1000 books (copyright
free / open domain )
This is stored on a Memory Card / CD and delivered to Users
A simple activation process to handle mass-piracy.
The pilot marketing was successful. Gearing for next version.

Interesting Developments
Other Significant developments in India :
* Aakash Tablet
* Pratham Books
* Print-on-Demand
* Self-Publishing
* The FlipKart Story

Thank You !
Fublish.com | mobileveda.com
ganesh@mobileveda.com

Jason Ren
Founder
Little Thing Magazine
Jason Ren founded Little Thing Magazine to encourage people's awareness of 'the beautiful things in life.'
Jason has been running Little Thing Magazine for nearly 4 years. It’s a bi-monthly fashion magazine with a
focus on the creativity and lifestyle of the new generation Chinese females. Little Thing Magazine is
circulated in over twenty two big cities in China, including Hong Kong, and has won the title of 'the most
beloved fashion magazine for creative and artistic girls' in the country. As co-founder and publisher of the
magazine, Jason manages everything from advertisement, circulation and branding to finance and HR. The
magazine’s slogan is ‘we collect beautiful things’ and aim to encourage awareness of the beautiful little
things in their life. To achieve this, the magazine conducts firsthand interview with designers and artists in
different countries and create inspiring fashion images. In 2011, the success of the project has led to an
exciting product line and shopping experience. With the idea of social entrepreneurship, Little Thing
Magazine launched its online and retail shop to sell their products, namely independent designer items and
fair trade products from all over the world. Before founding little thing magazine, Jason studied in CEIBS for
MBA from 2004-2006 (exchanged in HEC, Paris in 2005) and worked in marketing for different multinational
companies like GE and AC Nielson for more than 10 years. Jason is a winner of the YCE Publishing Award
2012.

Brief Review of Challenges in
China Publishing Industry
Jason Ren (China)
Little thing magazine
Apr.2012

Current in China Publishing Industry
• Publishing organization reform and integration keep deepening
- New opportunity to some open minded traditional state owned publishing groups
Liu bin jie
- Some conservative and less market focused organizations will face bankruptcy
Chief Director of The General
Administration of press and
publications
• Severe stock issue, higher circulation cost, less profitability
- In mainstream book selling Channel, Xin Hua bookstore, stock higher than total
books sold
- Large stock in books occupied Publishing house capital, cash flow and
increased circulation cost
• Major publishing profit from teaching material related sector
- teaching material makes up over 50% of share in China publishing industry, size and
profit
- in the future, teaching material reuse will totally change some publishing house biz model
• Popularity on Digital terminal and internet reading
- Digital, mobile & internet publishing is more considerable to new publishers
- Prosperous online book selling changes traditional small bookstore business
environment

Key Challenges in China Publishing Industry
• New Books hard to re-publish
- 55% of new books per year not able to be republished, waste of
content
• Niche positioned high quality books hard to publish
- Niche positioned books due to sizable problem hard to get break even, no
publishing house would like to publish
- High quality content not easy to reserve and broadcast
• Starting printing number
- Lots of book stock caused by the “have to” print number, over printing to meet
start print number
New Business Model in China publishing Industry?
- On demand publishing?
- Digital publishing?

Challenges and New
Business Model in China
Magazine Industry

Key Challenges in China Magazine Market
• Great competition from Online Media
- more advertisers shift from magazine to web
- quickly shrinking magazine AD budget
- online competitors have larger volume big online players
- easier to track and better data on viewers
•Quickly shrinking reader base and circulation
- from end 2011, a lot of magazine titles facing quickly shrinking circulation
- in some segments, the shrinking can be up to half
Shrinking circulation
- many more readers looking for information from website, special forums and blogs
• Fierce competition in current sector, limited circulation channel, new
media hard to survive
- Chinese magazine market is not deeply fragmented, magazines are fighting closely
- distribution channels limited to newsstands operated by local post , high enter barrier
- difficult for new titles to gain sizable readers and circulation, hard to attract AD
Fierce competition
• Lack courage to try new business model
- most magazines still focus on AD selling and try to keep circulation size
Instyle left
- lack of resources (human, finance, ideas) to try new biz model China market
- worry to make mistake after 3 years

New attempts made in the market
• Online gateway
- some magazines go online to leverage brand
name as gateway to attract online advertisement,
yet still a long way to go
Online portal
•App
- nearly every big magazine titles launched their APP for free
- some of them get good readership and start selling AD
- new model to be discovered
• Sell online
- some magazines leverage their name to build online B to C portal
including us
- product from sports shoes to low price clothes to luxury goods
- still at beginning stage, wait and see

Little thing
Magazine Business
Model Introduction

The most Beloved
fashion magazine
for Creative &
Artistic girls!

Business Model of little thing
Pop up card
Business model:
• Publishing - A great reading inspiration for fashion, creativity, handmade, lifestyle and art
• Advertisement – An integrated marketing partner with strong creativity and wide resources
• Product – A sales platform for independent designers, fair trade, recycled and handmade
A creative brand itself for fashion clothing, accessories and stationery

Publishing
Magazine basics:
25RMB, bimonthly issue, 4 years publishing, high quality eco friendly paper, golden printing award,
Circulation in key cities of mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore & Malaysia
Team basic:
16 people in house with contributing journalist in London, Paris,Tokyo and Australia
Magazine selling itself can be a profitable business
- By good control of selling rate and increased subscription
Potential business opportunity in publishing
•High quality magazine content
- book publishing (with authors & creators in little thing mag)
•Sell in cool coffee & book shops, multi-brand creative shops
- limited edition of gift pack magazine(20Euro each) in select channels

Advertisement Little thing - An Integrated Marketing Partner
Online marketing &
Not Just page, but ideas Influencer Resources Creative Event marketing
Harmony AD Environment On-line marketing
Little thing x MIXC
Shopping mall exhibition with artist
插画家 Little thing influencers
illustrator Little thing x Adidas Originals
designer
Independent female artist exhibition
Creative Advertorial
photographer
Fashion critics
artist
curator
buyer Stylist & blogger

Product
Little thing online shop Little thing showroom
A online platform for independent designer A bridge for independent designer and
and little thing itself as a creative brand creative shops and buyers in China & Asia

Little Thing - the influence of community, a little thing village
A little thing community for creativity, art and people with love!
Little Thing communication
Eg. Newsletter, Little Treats, Road
Core image shows, IMart. ect
Little Thing
Emotional link
Magazine
Co-work with
Little other commercial
Official Web,
weibo, other
Little Thing Collaborated brand
social media Online Project
More than magazine
Care and interact it’s a Community! Commercial value -
surprise
Little Thing
Little Event Little Voice for
Concept Shop, Store
Music, Other
Online Shop Event for Fashion,
Arts…
Ownership participant

Thanks!
Little thing magazine
We collect beautiful things!

The Future of International
Publishing Start-Ups
British Council's Young Creative Entrepreneur Publishing
winners present market insights and innovative business
models from China, India, Turkey and South Africa.
For more information, visit
http://creativeconomy.britishcouncil.org/