• Zola Books

  Participated · Seed · Nov 2013

  Zola Books builds tools to enable book discovery and retail across the web, including an “Everywhere Store” widget that lets any site sell books with minimal code. The company has acquired the complete catalogs of major publishers such as Penguin Random House, HarperCollins, Hachette, Simon & Schuster, and Macmillan, allowing sites to retail both traditionally published and self-published works. Zola also operates a recommendation engine, Bookish Recommends, which it acquired in 2014 and that is used by millions of patrons every month at more than a dozen North American libraries. Founded in late 2011 and based in New York, Zola has pursued product expansion through both technology development and strategic content acquisitions. The company recently raised follow-on financing to support its growth and distribution efforts. No revenue or user-revenue metrics were disclosed in the article. Zola Books operates an independent e-book retail service that sells titles from major publishers as well as new and backlist e-book titles not available elsewhere. Its catalog includes works such as five titles from Joan Didion, five from John Gregory Dunne, Big Fish by Daniel Wallace, The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger, The New Hunger by Isaac Marion, and The Accidental Victim by James Reston Jr. The e-books are distributed through the company's Zola Books iPhone/iPad app. The company closed a $5.1m seed round to fund growth and intends to use the proceeds to expand engineering and strategic partnership initiatives. The seed financing increased previously announced financing, adding $3.9m to an earlier $1.2m. The round reflects backing from a mix of authors and individual investors led by Charles Dolan. Zola Books is launching a private beta of its Zola Social Reader, a social eBooks site that enables discovery, buying and discussion of books. The platform will offer native and HTML5 apps for Kindle Fire, Nook and iPad and emphasizes social features such as algorithmic recommendations, curated lists by publishers/authors/readers, and passage highlighting and commenting visible to friends. Zola plans to use an agency pricing model that gives authors and publishers control over pricing for content exclusive to the site and will offer DRM‑free exclusive content. The company says it will provide publishers and authors with detailed geographic and demographic sales insights, branded storefronts for independent bookstores, and an email‑marketing tool that can import authors’ social posts. Zola has raised $1 million in seed funding from prominent authors and is positioning the product for broader launch once ongoing eBook pricing disputes between publishers and the U.S. Department of Justice are resolved. Founders CEO Joe Regal and COO Michael Strong are leading the company, and former Time/Life editor Bill Shapiro is joining as head of innovation and strategy.

No current team members are available.