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1st December 2008

Bloomsbury unveils academic imprint

05.09.08 Benedicte Page

Bloomsbury is making a bold move into academic publishing with the launch of an "on demand" imprint that will publish titles online for free. Bloomsbury Academic will be run by publisher Frances Pinter, making a return to UK publishing, with Jonathan Glasspool m.d.

The imprint will use Creative Commons licences to allow non-commercial use of all its titles on publication. Pinter described it as "a major commitment to spreading knowledge more easily throughout the world, with a sustainable business model".

She said it was the first time a major publishing company had devoted a whole imprint to this model. "We think it will work for certain kinds of books: it will promote our titles, which will be known because the students will have easy access to them in a digital form, and we will be relying on the institutional market and library sales." Titles will be sold as books using short-run technologies and print-on-demand.

The model will also allow Bloomsbury to bring titles swiftly to publication by side-stepping long production and promotion cycles.

Glasspool said the idea had come from Pinter, who set up her own academic house at 23, before taking on a role at the Soros Foundation. "Frances had a conversation with [Bloomsbury executive director] Richard Charkin at the LBF, and Richard got it straight away," said Glasspool.

"It struck us as an innovative and imaginative approach." He added that the initiative "fits well with our strategic vision of diversifying further into specialist publishing areas."

The list will concentrate on monographs rather than reference titles. Bloomsbury Academic will initially cover humanities and social science titles, building thematic lists on "pressing global issues." Editors are currently being hired, and the first titles will be published in summer 2009, with a total of 50 anticipated by the end of 2009.

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