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Coates to launch Bilbary e-book site
02.12.11 | Benedicte Page
Former Waterstone's m.d. Tim Coates is to launch Bilbary (www.bilbary.com), an international online consumer site for the sale and lending of e-books.
Coates is in final negotiations with five of the big six trade publishers, with agreements already in place with "most" major academic publishers. He said he expects 300,000–400,000 titles—half academic and half trade—to be available on the site when it goes live in the UK, US and Australia either shortly before Christmas or in the new year.
The venture is backed by private investors including John Bartle of ad agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty. It operates from a London office in Bedford Square, WC1, with a small team including site editor Amy Riach and technical director Vijay Sodiwala. There are also offices in New York and California, where US trade stalwart Con Sayer is handling publisher relations.
Coates said the site would "bring the skill of the bookseller and librarian" to the online arena, with panels of booksellers set to offer "shop window" recommendations, and with librarians available to answer readers' questions.
"Readers are going to be the obsessive focus of this site," said Coates. "It won't sell anything else. It's the site to come to for everything, for readers' groups, for recommendations, and it will be linked to Facebook." He added: "The student can get hold of a book you can't get from the university library direct from the publisher. Academic publishers see real potential."
The digitisation of large literature backlists is also a priority for Bilbary.
The site is dealing both on agency agreements and traditional distribution agreements, with publishers set to take 80% of the revenue. A typical charge for lending is likely to be 25% of a book's r.r.p. for a 20-day loan.
Publishers can track sales patterns through the site, and Coates has promised a swift transfer of revenues. "The money can go literally from the customer to the publisher and author," he said.
A long-time library campaigner, Coates said Bilbary would aid public libraries. "Trade publishers don't want to lend at present. There has been huge sales growth in e-books this year and nobody wants to damage that. In time, we think there will be lending, and here is a space where they can experiment.
"The public library service doesn't have to create its own e-digital library by buying speculatively, they can use this as a service. Publishers will be paid for every loan. It could solve the problem, [currently causing a stalemate on e-lending], and then the library service would have an e-book solution. "
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Can Tim stop pretending now that his 'libraries campaign' was anything other than an attempt to shore up publishers sales?
Crumbs 25% of rrp for a 20 day loan! I am not sure that is the solution to the library lending question.
Oh "tosh" Mr Lit man. Where were you when the residents of Swindon were struggling to save libraries ? Mr Coates came here for no charge, wrote a report on Libraries for our council for no charge, was key speaker at a public meeting for no charge and has over the years generally supported all campaigners here from early 2009 to the present day. That is typical of him, to do quiet kindly stuff for ordinary people without fanfare. You, on the contrary, have no track record with me by which I can judge you -- but I do think that anyone who makes snide remarks under a pseudonym is unworthy of much respect.
Wow big move Tim well done . I think lending of e books could be a big opportunity in particular . Maybe the backroom stuff could be handled for you by a wholesaler , both of whom are rapidly gearing up to wholesaling E book content ?. Better to use their investment in technology and stock than tie your new cash up whilst you await volume .
Fine, I don't much respect people who don't engage with the actual argument Shirley. I said nothing about whether Tim had been rewarded or not. He is clearly a passionate advocate for books in libraries, and has done much good work. I have no idea whether he has been financially rewarded or not. My point is simply that Tim has fought a narrow campaign to the wider benefit of publishers everywhere. He was never really about libraries, but about the books they could peddle. So now he turns about face, and sets up his own lending library following a thoroughly commercial model that further undermines what libraries are trying to do. Good luck to him, but I think it somewhat betrays his original mindset all along.
There is something not quite right here and I cannot put my finger on it. There is a lot of spin here and it feels typically Coates-like. All very polished but ultimately very thin. The model is nothing new as other ebook sellers already do this and have similar coverage. Plus he expects 300-400k, he doesn't have them yet and this press release (duly released and advertised for free by the Bookseller) only helps draw in more content. It shows what good spin and a bit of nous can do for a friend of the Bookseller.
You are wrong about Tim ,Lit man. Yes he spent rather a lot of time on library efficiency particularly regarding library stock and acquisition but that is difficult to avoid isn't it? The fact that a more efficient policy would release more funds to spend on books [rather than their acquisition process]and publishers publish books , is also difficult to avoid .
Hi Steven, I take your point, and I made the same argument when it was presented at the news meeting. But the fact is Tim Coates is not an unknown in the trade and that does matter, as does having 'nous', he has a good track-record, strong backing, has deals in place with a number of publishers and is 'close' to other deals (both here and in the US), and it looks like a viable model - at least until Amazon starts lending (though even then given Tim's approach when compared to Amazon in the US, who knows).
Ben was also able to dig a little bit deeper with Tim, particularly on how it would go down in the library community [take note Lit man].
So, all in, I thought the coverage was fair.
Oh no, my comment has disappeared again. I didn't even say anything controversial (this time).
Philip is fair in his assessment apart from, in my opinion, an assessment that Coates has a good track-record. Not for the last decade at the very least. It is a model that copies elements of all that is currently available, and less, in the market already.
Could someone from Bilbary contact us please, there is no way to via your site, thanks.
Paul Andrews
CEO
www.andrewsuk.com
Sorry Steven that shouldn't have come off, especially since I responded to it! It is reinstated. Agree it's not radical, but the company that gets its model right and holds its nerve will do well.
I did not intend my initial entry to be entirely a criticism. We all need help in these tough times fighting the international behemoths and if Coates can use the Bookseller in this way, good luck to him. The frustration is about the fact that these models already exist and that they are being applied arguably more successfully already. Many of the ebook-ers have had to do the hard schlep of going from publisher to publisher, defining contracts, defining rights limitations, analysing models and all the rest of it. To read these articles in the Bookseller you would think that there was only Amazon, Kobo and Coates. As a publisher we get six figure revenues from the ebook vendors who never get mentioned.
"UK, US and Australia"... I'm guessing this will be another site that refuses to sell anything to English speakers in other parts of the world. Oh well.
The site will be available to English speakers - and other language speakers worldwide including Europe - from the outset. Initially the content will be be English language, but we hope to include other languages as quickly as we can. We will endeavour to keep to publishers' territorial requirements. There is a timetable for handling different currencies and card payment methods that will take longer to implement, but that, too, we will progress as fast as possible. Thank you for all the responses - we have been inundated.
Can Tim stop pretending now that his 'libraries campaign' was anything other than an attempt to shore up publishers sales?
Crumbs 25% of rrp for a 20 day loan! I am not sure that is the solution to the library lending question.
Oh "tosh" Mr Lit man. Where were you when the residents of Swindon were struggling to save libraries ? Mr Coates came here for no charge, wrote a report on Libraries for our council for no charge, was key speaker at a public meeting for no charge and has over the years generally supported all campaigners here from early 2009 to the present day. That is typical of him, to do quiet kindly stuff for ordinary people without fanfare. You, on the contrary, have no track record with me by which I can judge you -- but I do think that anyone who makes snide remarks under a pseudonym is unworthy of much respect.
Wow big move Tim well done . I think lending of e books could be a big opportunity in particular . Maybe the backroom stuff could be handled for you by a wholesaler , both of whom are rapidly gearing up to wholesaling E book content ?. Better to use their investment in technology and stock than tie your new cash up whilst you await volume .
Fine, I don't much respect people who don't engage with the actual argument Shirley. I said nothing about whether Tim had been rewarded or not. He is clearly a passionate advocate for books in libraries, and has done much good work. I have no idea whether he has been financially rewarded or not. My point is simply that Tim has fought a narrow campaign to the wider benefit of publishers everywhere. He was never really about libraries, but about the books they could peddle. So now he turns about face, and sets up his own lending library following a thoroughly commercial model that further undermines what libraries are trying to do. Good luck to him, but I think it somewhat betrays his original mindset all along.
There is something not quite right here and I cannot put my finger on it. There is a lot of spin here and it feels typically Coates-like. All very polished but ultimately very thin. The model is nothing new as other ebook sellers already do this and have similar coverage. Plus he expects 300-400k, he doesn't have them yet and this press release (duly released and advertised for free by the Bookseller) only helps draw in more content. It shows what good spin and a bit of nous can do for a friend of the Bookseller.
You are wrong about Tim ,Lit man. Yes he spent rather a lot of time on library efficiency particularly regarding library stock and acquisition but that is difficult to avoid isn't it? The fact that a more efficient policy would release more funds to spend on books [rather than their acquisition process]and publishers publish books , is also difficult to avoid .
Hi Steven, I take your point, and I made the same argument when it was presented at the news meeting. But the fact is Tim Coates is not an unknown in the trade and that does matter, as does having 'nous', he has a good track-record, strong backing, has deals in place with a number of publishers and is 'close' to other deals (both here and in the US), and it looks like a viable model - at least until Amazon starts lending (though even then given Tim's approach when compared to Amazon in the US, who knows).
Ben was also able to dig a little bit deeper with Tim, particularly on how it would go down in the library community [take note Lit man].
So, all in, I thought the coverage was fair.
Oh no, my comment has disappeared again. I didn't even say anything controversial (this time).
Philip is fair in his assessment apart from, in my opinion, an assessment that Coates has a good track-record. Not for the last decade at the very least. It is a model that copies elements of all that is currently available, and less, in the market already.
Could someone from Bilbary contact us please, there is no way to via your site, thanks.
Paul Andrews
CEO
www.andrewsuk.com
Sorry Steven that shouldn't have come off, especially since I responded to it! It is reinstated. Agree it's not radical, but the company that gets its model right and holds its nerve will do well.
I did not intend my initial entry to be entirely a criticism. We all need help in these tough times fighting the international behemoths and if Coates can use the Bookseller in this way, good luck to him. The frustration is about the fact that these models already exist and that they are being applied arguably more successfully already. Many of the ebook-ers have had to do the hard schlep of going from publisher to publisher, defining contracts, defining rights limitations, analysing models and all the rest of it. To read these articles in the Bookseller you would think that there was only Amazon, Kobo and Coates. As a publisher we get six figure revenues from the ebook vendors who never get mentioned.
"UK, US and Australia"... I'm guessing this will be another site that refuses to sell anything to English speakers in other parts of the world. Oh well.
The site will be available to English speakers - and other language speakers worldwide including Europe - from the outset. Initially the content will be be English language, but we hope to include other languages as quickly as we can. We will endeavour to keep to publishers' territorial requirements. There is a timetable for handling different currencies and card payment methods that will take longer to implement, but that, too, we will progress as fast as possible. Thank you for all the responses - we have been inundated.