Re: Gale buys Questia

["Paula Hane" <phane@infotoday.com>]

For more details of the acquisition:

Gale Reaches for More End Users With Questia Acquisition
by Paula J. Hane
Posted On February 1, 2010
http://newsbreaks.infotoday.com/NewsBreaks/Gale-Reaches-for-More-End-Users-With-Questia-Acquisition-60895.asp

excerpts:

Questia's book content is a clear attraction for Gale, adding 
scholarly content from leading publishers to support learning in 
high school and college-a great complement to Gale's extensive 
reference content. As for the articles, they are mostly licensed 
from Gale, a longtime partner.

In addition to the synergies of HighBeam and Encyclopedia.com 
with Questia, Gale will look to integrate Questia with its 
AccessMyLibrary service (www.accessmylibrary.com), which connects 
users through web services to their local libraries for access to 
more than 30 million articles from premium sources.

Paula J. Hane
News Bureau Chief, Information Today, Inc.
Editor, NewsBreaks, Infotoday.com
phane@infotoday.com
www.infotoday.com

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
[mailto:owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu] On Behalf Of Joseph Esposito
Sent: Monday, February 08, 2010 6:50 PM
To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
Subject: Re: Gale buys Questia

Of course we will not know what Gale (a division of Cengage)
plans to do with Questia until the company takes its steps in the
marketplace, but I would be very surprised to discover that the
basis of the acquisition is to have people pay for the same
content twice.

Cengage is an exceedingly sophisticated organization; among other
recent initiatives is the launch of a digital textbook rental
program. The company's CEO is committed to an all-digital vision.

Among the things to look for or think about:  How many libraries
do in fact have all the Questia titles in their collections?
Does Questia have the rights for institutional sales to all its
titles (Questia is an aggregator, not an originating publisher)?
What to make of the tools that Questia brings to its content,
which are different in kind and complexity from Gale's?

I would imagine that the acquisition model for this transaction
covers a number of items, including expense reductions
(overlapping infrastructure) and cross-marketing strategies.

But if I had to bet on the biggest driver (this is pure
speculation), the appeal of Questia for Gale may be its
direct-to-consumer platform, something that neither Gale nor any
division of Cengage has without Questia.  If this is true, this
would be yet another (the examples keep piling up) of a library
bypass strategy.  Why such a strategy? Because library budgets
are not growing and in many instances are shrinking.  Thus
publishers are seeking other venues for their wares.

Joe Esposito