Spanish, like English, is spoken and read by millions of native speakers in many countries spread across different continents. It is the second most studied and the third most spoken language on the planet (Mandarin and English being the only ones larger). However, the Spanish-language and English-language markets are very different, and the digital disruption seems to have accentuated those differences. The Spanish-language publishing industry has developed with a great concentration of rights-holding—and therefore commercial control—in one country, Spain, where the “big three” (Planeta, Santillana, Random House Mondadori) have their headquarters, despite the fact that the Latin American countries in the aggregate are a much bigger potential market with hundreds of millions of readers. Mexico alone has a population of 115 million, while the US is home to 55 million Hispanics, and Spain, with a population of 47 million, is closer to the sizes of Colombia and Argentina. While ebook conversion and reading have taken off in English, the adoption has been much slower in Spanish. Availability, of course, is key. While ebookstores often offer about 3 million titles in ePub in English, there are hardly more than 75,000 titles available in Spanish counting free titles and PDFs. It would appear that, like in English, growth in ebooks in Spanish-language markets could spawn translations into Spanish by publishers who originally publish in other languages to enter the market themselves. A panel of top Spanish-language publishing executives will talk about why ebooks have been slower to take hold in Spanish, what the future holds, and whether the historical dominance of Spain itself for global Spanish-language publishing is likely to continue or will be eroded by the forces of digital change.

1. Spanish-language
Publishing, a Global
Industry
Santos Palazzi, Head of Mass Market and Digital Books
Division at Grupo Planeta
Arantza Larrauri, CEO, Libranda
Patricia Arancibia, Editorial Director - International Digital
Content, Barnes & Noble / NOOK

2. 450+ Million Speakers
2nd most spoken
language
3rd most studied
language

3. Latin America
90,000 to 250,000 titles live in Spanish
in print in each country
60,000 ePubs available in digital in the
planet counting free, self published
eBooks from Spain priced as in Europe
Digital rights negotiations not cleared

4. Latin America
Digital less than 1% of sales
Argentina, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Chile,
Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, French
Guiana, Guyana, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua,
Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay,
Venezuela

5. United States
40% of the eBooks coming
from Spain on sale in the U.S.
are priced U$10+
79% of the sales come from
titles under U$10

6. United States
16% of the eBooks
coming from Spain on
sale in the U.S. are
priced U$13+

7. Percentage of US Latinos
who read an eBook in the
last year
23%
Source: Pew Internet Center April 5 2012

8. Titles available in ePub in Spanish in
the world (approx.)
60 000
Titles available in ePub in English in
the world (approx.)
3 million

9. Print Titles in Spanish (aprox.)
Spain
400,000
Latin American Countries
90,000 - 250,000
US
in stock 10,000 ● on sale 25,000

10. Digital Rights
Slow negotiations between publishers and
agents
Some agents impose digital price as a percentage of
the print price
English-language publishers start to see Spanish as
their second language.
Authors sell their own translations

11. In Latin America, eBooks from Spain at European prices.
GDP per capita, 2000-2009
Compared Mexico/EU
Source: European Commission Eurostat

12. Thanks
Gracias
Danke