Booktopia faces uncertain future
Earlier this month, trading of shares in online bookseller Booktopia on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) was suspended, pending an announcement from the company.
An extension of the trading suspension on 21 June revealed the company is ‘not yet in a position where it is capable of making an announcement around the outcome of its strategic review including that of seeking additional funding’. Booktopia further advised it’s facing ‘broader liquidity challenges’ and is seeking alternative sources of funding liquidity to meet redundancy costs and provide it with ongoing working capital; and is exploring ‘alternative strategic options’. It added that it has ‘indicative interest’ from parties that are undertaking due diligence of the company to determine if support will be forthcoming.
Booktopia last traded at 4.5c per share, giving the company a market capitalisation of just $10.3 million. The company was first listed on the ASX in December 2020, following an initial public offering (IPO) of shares issued at $2.30 per share, for a market capitalisation of $315.8 million.
The suspension of trading comes after a string of recent bad news from the company. Earlier this month, it announced plans for a substantial restructure, including considering at least 50 roles for redundancy, alongside news that CEO David Nenke had tendered his resignation from the role, effective immediately. In March, Booktopia reported its revenue in the half-year to 31 December was down 21% compared to the corresponding period last financial year. In the half-year report, auditors RSM Australia Partners noted there is a material uncertainty ‘that may cast significant doubt on [Booktopia’s] ability to continue as a going concern’, for reasons including Booktopia’s net loss of $16.7 million for the six months to 31 December, its liabilities exceeding its total assets by $39.5 million, and its net liabilities totalling $20.9 million, ‘along with other matters’.
However, Booktopia’s downfall doesn’t mean people aren’t reading, nor is it indicative of the state of the Australian bookselling industry, BookPeople (formerly the Australian Booksellers Association) CEO Robbie Egan told the SMH/Age.
IPEd guide to working with freelance editors
The Institute of Professional Editors (IPEd) has developed a guide for clients to know what to expect when working with a freelance editor.
The guide sets out basic professional and ethical principles, so both parties can approach the project with a clear understanding of what is required. Processes covered include agreeing on the work; defining the scope of work; varying the agreement; communicating; providing supporting documents; payment; and dealing with disputes.
Visit the IPEd website to view the guide.
Final Vogel winner announced; awards round-up
First Year by Kristina Ross has won this year’s $20,000 Australian/Vogel’s Literary Award, for an unpublished manuscript by an author under the age of 35.
As previously reported by Books+Publishing, this year’s Australian/Vogel’s Award will be the last, with the Australian’s literary editor Caroline Overington stating the newspaper will ‘honour [the Vogel’s] legacy’ with a new prize, ‘open to all Australian writers—regardless of age’. The new Australian Fiction Prize will be presented in partnership with HarperCollins, with the winner to receive prize money of $20,000, plus an advance of $15,000, and publication by HarperCollins.
In the US, Robyne Hanley-Dafoe won the 2024 BookLife Nonfiction Prize for self-published writers for her self-help manual Stress Wisely: How to be well in an unwell world. Hanley-Dafoe—an education and psychology instructor as well as an author—spoke to BookLife about her book. Entries for the prize’s fiction category are now open.
In local literary awards news, the winners of the NSW and WA premier’s literary awards were announced, Melbourne writer Caroline Stills was named winner of the 2024 Text Prize for an unpublished manuscript, and Kaya Ortiz won UWA Publishing’s Dorothy Hewett Award for their unpublished poetry manuscript Past and Parallel Lives.
US audiobook revenue up 9%
The Audio Publishers Association (APA) released annual sales survey results showing the US audiobook market grew by 9% to $2 billion (A$3.00b) in 2023, reports Publishers Weekly (PW).
The sales survey incorporates data from 27 publishers, including Audible, Hachette Audio, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Penguin Random House, and Simon & Schuster, among others. The APA has previously reported 11 consecutive years of double-digit growth in the market. Alongside the survey results, the APA also released results from its audio consumer survey, conducted by Edison Research, which found 38% of American adults had listened to an audiobook in the past year, up from 35% in the previous report, with the most avid audiobook listeners consuming an average of 6.8 titles, an increase from 6.3 in the previous year. Among a broader survey group, which included those who had never listened to an audiobook, the average number of audiobooks listened to was 4.8, up from 4.0 in the prior year.
Fiction remains the top category among audiobook consumers for the third consecutive year, accounting for 64% of sales revenue, while the categories that grew the fastest included history/biography/memoir (up 22%); health and fitness (up 20%); religious/faith-based titles (up 17%); and romance (up 14%).
PW reported that piracy remains a concern for the industry, with 47% of respondents who listened to an audiobook in the last year saying they got an audiobook for free through YouTube or another file-sharing website.
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