NewSpring Capital Leads Equity Investment in Pioneering Digital Publisher Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
August 19, 2013
NewSpring Capital, a family of private equity funds providing growth and expansion capital, announced today that NewSpring Growth Capital, the firm's dedicated technology and business services growth equity fund, led an $11.0 million Series C equity financing in Open Road Integrated Media, Inc. ("Open Road") with an $8.0 million investment. Existing investors, Kohlberg Ventures, Azure Capital, and Golden Seeds, also joined NewSpring in the financing.
Open Road, a digital publisher and multimedia content company, published its first ebook in May 2010. Three short years later, the Company publishes and markets just over 4,000 ebooks from more than 500 authors. Open Road's growing backlist catalog includes literary fiction from authors such as Pat Conroy, Alice Walker, Iris Murdoch, Michael Chabon, James Jones and a wide variety of writers across verticals and genres including Pearl S. Buck, Dorothy Sayers, Virginia Hamilton, John Jakes and Octavia Butler. The Company also works with independent publishers to digitally publish and market their ebooks and frontlist titles that are born digitally. Open Road continuously markets its authors through a proprietary online marketing platform.
"As we continue to build Open Road into the premier digital publishing and marketing company, we welcome NewSpring Capital with all its experience in the digital space," said Jane Friedman, Open Road's co-founder and chief executive officer. "With their support and the continued backing from existing investors, Kohlberg Ventures, Azure Capital and Golden Seeds, Open Road is the company that is looking to the future. It will become the model for the 21st century publishing and digital media company."
Mike DiPiano, Managing General Partner of NewSpring, who now joins Open Road's Board of Directors, said, "There is huge disruption in the publishing industry as business models are rapidly evolving and ebooks are becoming a greater share of overall trade book sales. Open Road, as a digital publisher of ebooks with a focus on the vast number of backlist titles, is perfectly poised to deliver value to its authors as its marketing approach uniquely focuses on authors as brands and systematically creates authentic connections between the authors and the reader. Jane Friedman and her talented team have developed a proven, scalable publishing and marketing platform and we are excited to join the Company in its future trailblazing in the industry." To learn more, visit www.openroadmedia.com.