Harlequin Signs On With LibreDigital
-- Publishers Weekly, 4/23/2008 12:01:00 AM
Harlequin, the leading publisher of romance and women’s fiction, announced today that LibreDigital will now handle all of its digital book projects, including its e-books, as well as online browsing capabilities via widgets and its Browse the Book tool.
Brent Lewis, Harlequin’s v-p of Internet and Digital, said LibreDigital is, “very innovative in their products. They can meet our ambitions going forward.” Last September, Harlequin announced that it would make its entire frontlist available in e-book format; in addition to the browsing tools, from now on, LibreDigital will handle Harlequin’s e-books through its digital warehouse: “Having it all under one house is really important to us, said Lewis.” Other future goals include using LibreDigital’s browsing and warehousing tools in conjunction with e-tailers like Amazon. According to Lewis,“one of our goals is to have all our partners utilize this.”
Romance readers are an extremely active online community, Lewis noted. “Now, we can talk to our readers and have them interact with each other in ways we never imagined before.” Harlequin is also excited about LibreDigital’s DRM, which Lewis calls “first class technology.”
LibreDigital is the division of NewsStand that handles digital books for publishers such as HarperCollins, Bloomsbury and Hachette.
