Amazon.com Plans To Buy Online Bookseller AbeBooks
Amazon.com, the world’s largest Internet retailer’s collection of books is about to grow larger, older, and rarer. The company on Friday announced that it plans to acquire Victoria-based rare and out of print books specialist AbeBooks.com for an undisclosed sum.
No financial terms of the acquisition were given, but Amazon, headquartered in Seattle, said the takeover, which is subject to regulatory approvals, is estimated to be completed during the fourth quarter of 2008.
Privately held AbeBooks, based in British Columbia, Canada, founded in 1996, lists books from thousands of independent sellers worldwide, Amazon said. The online retailer sells more than 110 million titles of used, rare, and out-of-print books around the world.
“As a leader in rare and hard-to-find books, AbeBooks brings added breadth and expanded selection to our customers worldwide,” Russell vice-president of books for Amazon.com, said in a statement.
“AbeBooks offers a wide range of services to both sellers and customers, and we look forward to working with them to further grow their business. We are excited to present all of our customers with the widest selection of books available any place on Earth,” said Grandinetti.
In 2002, the company started to trade some books through Amazon’s Marketplace program, which enabled its 13,500 bookseller members, who pay a monthly subscription fee to list their inventory in Amazon.com’s catalog.
“This deal connects book sellers and book lovers from around the world, and offers both types of customers a great experience,” said Hannes Blum, chief executive officer of AbeBooks. “We are very excited to be joining the Amazon family.”
Amazon.com says that AbeBooks will continue to function as a standalone operation based in Victoria, British Columbia. It will maintain all of its Web sites, including the ones in Canada with Canadian content, such as reviews of Canadian-authored books and interviews Canadian writers.
So far, this takeover is the third major acquisition Amazon has made this year. Earlier, it took over digital book download site Audible for $300m in March and in June it bought online fabric store Fabric.com, based in Marietta, Ga., which expands Amazon’s offerings in the growing craft and hobby marketplace.