4. BRAZIL’S DIGITAL CLOUD OF BOOKS
Brazil is seeing rapid growth in e‐lending, thanks to a growing supply of e‐books, publishers building digital catalogues and government projects which focus on acquiring digital assets. In common with other emerging countries, initial difficulties (lack of libraries, inequality of access) have worked in favour of the mass incorporation of digital solutions. The vast scale of the Brazilian market has attracted a variety of actors (publishers, aggregators, mobile operators etc) to develop commercial digital libraries, usually operating under subscription models.
The main schemes are as follows:
1. Minha Biblioteca
In 2011, four Brazilian academic publishing houses – Grupo A, Atlas, Grupo GEN and Saraiva – launched the Minha Biblioteca (“my library”) project, aimed specifically at higher education institutions. The 4,000 titles available through the platform cover different disciplines (law, social sciences, health) and can be acquired either through subscription or perpetual purchase.
2. Nuvem de livros
Developed by Gol Mobile and launched in 2011, Nuvem de Livros (“Cloud of Books”) has already acquired over one million subscribers. Subscription costs vary depending on the type of contract, ranging from $2.70 to $8.90 per month. Readers must be connected to the internet to view a wide‐ranging catalogue of 11,000 works. Access can be made via any type of device.
3. Árvore de livros
Árvore de livros (“tree of books”) launched in 2013, targeting the public sector, schools and private companies. Its catalogue offers 200,000 e‐books. Payment is on a subscription basis, while access is provided via any device connected to the web, although titles can also be read offline, eg on e‐readers. Each user can browse up to 3 works simultaneously and publishers participating in the project can monitor the performance of loans in real time as well as being able to analyze reading behavior and user profiles.
4. Biblioteca Xeriph
In February 2014, the digital distributor Xeriph launched this service for municipal and corporate libraries. It offers titles from 280 publishers and provides two purchasing options: loan or subscription. In the loan option, the library buys the book at a cover price, of which the publisher receives 60%, and after 14 days the book is returned to the system. In the subscription option, publishers are paid according to the number of hits for each work.
5. Biblioteca Saraiva
Saraiva is the biggest bookseller in Brazil. It has the most extensive bookshop chain, the biggest online bookstore and the largest e‐book catalogue. In March 2014, the company presented its own virtual library solution, stocked with a catalogue of 1,500 titles. Institutions subscribing to Biblioteca Saraiva will be able to acquire e‐books at a cover price and access increasing discounts, depending on the number of titles requested.