Italy-based digital books distributor and publishing facilitator StreetLib has completed the fourth stage of its global roll-out with all of the Middle East and South Asia enfranchised. The company now offers an author and publisher portal for literally half the world.

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[Press Release] StreetLib reaches half the world as digital publishing portals for Middle East and South Asia launched. Forecasts $5bn valuation for African publishing by 2025.

Loreto, Italy 1 April 2019

The Italy-based digital books distributor StreetLib has completed the fourth tranche of its global roll-out, announcing it now has a digital publishing portal for more than half the countries of the world.

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StreetLib CEO Giacomo D’Angelo said:

“This is a huge milestone in our pledge to provide an author & publisher portal for every country in the world. This takes our total to over 100 countries, enfranchising authors and publishers across half the planet.

Our April focus has been on the Middle East and South Asia.

We believe the global publishing industry has not kept up with the pace of technological development in the MENA and South Asia regions, and this part of the world is widely regarded as a digital backwater not worthy of attention.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Today the Arab book market, valued at over $1 billion, encompasses more than 200 million internet users.

Across South Asia, Pakistan has more internet users than Spain, Bangladesh has more internet users than Germany.

India’s book market is forecast to be worth $10 billion in 2020, and already India is the second largest country on the planet by internet users, ahead of the USA, Latin America and the European Union.

In addition we have launched our StreetLib Africa and StreetLib MENA Project Pages outlining our ambitions for these regions:

The Africa and MENA Projects are the result of the partnership between StreetLib and our sister company TNPS, on our common path to continue raising the awareness of the global publishing market opportunities and then building the digital distribution infrastructure needed to back these claims.

The StreetLib Africa project page includes a slidedeck entitled “21st Century African Publishing Industry Needs 21st Century Global Solutions” forecasting a potential $5 billion valuation for the continent’s book market by 2025:

StreetLib — Africa’s Digital Opportunity

This compliments the completion of our Pan-African roll-out in March that saw a publishing portal launched for every African nation.”

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As a gateway distributor StreetLib delivers digital content around the world through its partnership with retailers, digital libraries and subscription services, as well as its own ebook store, which uniquely supports content in all indigenous languages.

StreetLib invites authors, publishers and publishing industry stakeholders across Africa to partner with us to reach readers across the African continent and around the globe. All with no up-front costs.