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Hachette grants UK companies Euro rights

07.02.07 Philip Jones

The Hachette Book Group has granted exclusive European rights to its UK subsidiaries, in a move that prevents its US sister companies from marketing the same books in Europe. The decision means that Hachette's UK book businesses, including Hodder Headline, Time Warner and Orion, are able to exclusively sell books in Europe where the group owns world rights.

At the moment Europe's open market means that both US and UK publishers can sells books where they own rights into Europe--meaning that competing editions are often on sale, with the US book invariably priced more cheaply.

The move, according to the US publishing blog Galley Cat, has prompted an irate memo sent by Karl Heinz Petzler, managing director of the Portuguese distributor Lisma Lda. In it, he accuses the Hachette Book Group of a "cold coup", and "an unheard of act of self-castration" after a recent visit by an HBG representative who informed him that the company "had unilaterally decided that, whenever a book is published by both the US and the UK publishers belonging to that group, the respective UK publishers will have the exclusive distribution right in Europe".

David Young, head of Hachette Book Group USA, told Publishers Weekly that the decision was made by him and his counterpart in the UK, Tim Hely Hutchinson. "Putting two identical books into a relatively small market with no real marketing support is pointless," Young told the US magazine. As part of the agreement, the US units will have exclusive rights in the Far East and Asia in cases where Hachette has acquired world rights. Young said that a relatively small but significant number of authors would be affected.

Galley Cat

US Philip Jones Hachette david young euro rights Karl Heinz Petzler

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