Zola Books Acquires Bookish

Bookish
Zola Books, a New York, NY-based ebook social network and retailer, acquired Bookish, a site where readers get book recommendations.

The amount of the transaction was not disclosed.

With Bookish (which was launched in February 2013 by CEO Ardy Khazaei and backed by Hachette Book Group (HBG), Penguin Group (USA) and Simon & Schuster), Zola Books is acquiring a book recommendation technology, which is the result of a project to map the core characteristics that distinguish hundreds of thousands of books. It includes proprietary algorithms for matching content and readers and an application programming interface (API) for providing other sites and services with open access to the database.
The acquisition expands Zola’s technology platform, which includes an e-reader app with social sharing capabilities for iPhones and iPads as well as an e-commerce site selling ebooks from publishers and exclusive content from writers.
Zola Books will continue to enhance the Bookish site and will seek to develop new ways to provide readers with access to the recommendation engine by allowing other sites and services access to the recommendation engine through the API.

Led by Joe Regal, CEO, Zola the company is backed by Charles Dolan, founder of Cablevision and HBO, authors including Audrey Niffenegger and RZA, and prominent individual investors.

FinSMEs

10/01/2014

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