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Publishers' Forum Berlin, April 28th
This year, the
publishers' forum had a very strong
focus on education.
Most of the presentations are only available for participants, so if there is anything you would like to have a closer look at, let me know and I'll give you a password.
I was particularly intrigued by Michael E. Hanses's talk about how Cengage had changed in the last few years after chapter 11 (restructuring was completed in March 2014). Unfortunately, the PDF that is online doesn't contain any of the interesting figures, but here are a few things I have noted down:
Most of the presentations are only available for participants, so if there is anything you would like to have a closer look at, let me know and I'll give you a password.
I was particularly intrigued by Michael E. Hanses's talk about how Cengage had changed in the last few years after chapter 11 (restructuring was completed in March 2014). Unfortunately, the PDF that is online doesn't contain any of the interesting figures, but here are a few things I have noted down:
- used books make up 2/3 of the educational market in the US - publishers need to re-invent themselves.
- change the mindset - focus not on the product but on the student/user
- digital platform with 3.5 million students is the main money spinner now http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/cengage-learning-achieves-milestone-of-more-digital-units-sold-than-print-textbooks-300269060.html
- use students to write the textbook, have focus groups that are monitored 24/7
- main problems of students is time management - publisher needs to provide solution.
- out of about 4500 employees, 1500 are now software engineers