Book Depository co-founder to launch international online bookstore

Book Depository founder Emad Eldeen Elakehal will launch a new international online bookseller later this year, reports Internet Retailing. Elakehal founded the Book Depository in 2004 and was CEO for ten years, during which the company was acquired by Amazon in 2011. The new online bookseller ‘Ibiidi’ is a new ‘technology-driven platform that will help customers find the widest range of books published around the world’, and will focus on geographies currently untapped by other global sellers, including the Middle East and North Africa. ‘Readers who happen to live far from their homeland find themselves either missing out, with a wide range of their native titles being not available through their local book stores, or they may feel penalised by the excessive shipping charges they have to bear when ordering from retailers overseas,’ Elakehal said. ‘We will focus on developing an improved logistics network to give our customers, regardless where they reside, the ability to buy the books they desire at a reasonable price.’ Ibiidi is based in England, and has offices in Egypt and the United Arab Emirates

Category: International news