The challenges – and golden opportunities for publishers in a global perspective. Essay in „Die Welt“

In emerging economies, and despite manyfold challenges, many 100 millions of people have become ‚middle class‘ in the past one or two decades, looking for both entertainement (including reading!) and education (for themselves and their children).

In the international publishing business, huge international publishing corporations have emerged in that same time span. Think Penguin Random House, Hachette, HarperCollins. And yet, they could only marginally reach out to those new possible audiences.

Much bigger competitors – from Amazon to Facebook, from Apple to Asian groups like Rakuten or Tencent – are in a so much stronger position to take over those opportunities.

And what are the chances for local players, even big ones, in countries like Brazil or Russia, the Arab World, or Indonesia?

I wrote an essay on those questions, timed for today’s opening of the Frankfurt Book Fair, published (in german) in Die Welt.

To learn more about those international dimensions of the book business, join us at the Frankfur Book Fair for the CEO Talks tomorrow, Wednesday 14, 14.00 to 15.00 with Arnaud Nourry, Chairman and VCEO of Hachette, and with two leading independent publishers, Andrew Franklin of Profile Books (UK) and Marcos Pereira of Editora Sextante (Brazoil), Thursday, Oct 15, same time, in hall 4.2