Storytel Acquires Competitor Kitab Sawti - Creates the World's Largest Arabic Audiobook Offering
08 Jul, 2020, 14:01 BST
STOCKHOLM, July 8, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Storytel AB (publ) ("Storytel"), one of the world's leading audiobook and e-book streaming services, is acquiring Kitab Sawti, a leading audiobook streaming service in the Middle East and the Arabic speaking world. The combined line-up of Storytel Arabia and Kitab Sawti forms a unique offering of audio content production and distribution that will give consumers access to the biggest and richest Arabic audiobook library in the world.
Kitab Sawti is one of the leading producers and audiobook streaming services for Arabic content, operating a network of studios across the Arabic region and organising over 100 narrators. Founded in 2016 by Swedish entrepreneurs Sebastian Bond and Anton Pollak, the company has rapidly become a respected and popular advocate for quality audiobooks and cultural experiences in the Arabic speaking world, and thus a strong competitor to Storytel Arabia, which was launched in 2017.
"I am really thrilled and excited about the great opportunities that the combination of Storytel and Kitab Sawti will offer Arabic consumers, publishers and authorships. Online media consumption is booming in the Middle East, as is the confidence local consumers are showing in digital products and payment solutions. The positive trend in customer interest for audiobooks that we presently see in the region, clearly indicates the big potential. And this potential is also reflected in the leading combined skills and experiences of Storytel's and Kitab Sawti's amazing local Arabic teams", says Jonas Tellander, CEO and founder of Storytel.
Storytel is the #1 streaming service for audiobooks and e-books in Northern Europe with over 1.2 million paying subscribers and operations on 20 markets. Storytel also disposes over a vast library of more than 500,000 audiobook and e-book titles on a global scale.
Kitab Sawti, which achieved an annual sales growth of 79% in the first quarter of 2020 compared to the same period last year, operates in the categories audiobooks, entertainment, edutainment, audio content production and podcasts. The company disposes over a strong catalogue of 2,500+ audiobook titles covering more than 80% of the regional best-sellers including works like Celestial Bodies by Jokha Alharthi, The Bamboo Stalk by Saud Al Sanousi, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins and A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking. The combined audiobook catalogues of Storytel Arabia and Kitab Sawti will thus form a unique offering of 5,000+ audiobooks in Arabic - the biggest and richest Arabic audiobook library in the world.
With this acquisition, Storytel establishes a new geographic business region, Storytel MENA. Sebastian Bond, co-founder and current CEO of Kitab Sawti, will lead and oversee Storytel's business in MENA, which today consists of the Storytel Arabia and Kitab Sawti operations.
"We are really proud of what Kitab Sawti and our amazing team has achieved with our businesses in the Arabic region. I am confident that Storytel, with its technical capabilities, entrepreneurial spirit and multi-market experience, will be an excellent owner and develop these businesses further. I am also eager to experience the potential that will be unleashed as we continue to fuel the passion of the consumers and the unique qualities of the Arabic authorships, publishers and cultural life", says Sebastian Bond.
The parties have agreed not to disclose the purchase price which will not have a substantial impact on the Storytel Group's finances. The purchase price will be paid partly in cash and partly through the issuance of shares in Storytel AB (publ). The closing is expected to take place on 10 July 2020.
FNCA Sweden AB is the company's certified adviser. FNCA can be reached at info@fnca.se or +46 8 528 00 399.
For more information, please contact:
Storytel AB
Dan Panas, Head of Communications, Storytel AB
Tel: +46-70-186-52-90
Email: dan.panas@storytel.com
Kitab Sawti
Sebastian Bond, CEO and co-founder, Kitab Sawti
Tel: +971-58-578-4092
Email: sebastian@kitabsawti.com
About Storytel
Storytel is Northern Europe's leading audiobook and e-book streaming service and offers unlimited listening and reading of more than 500 000 titles on a global scale. Our vision is to make the world a more empathetic place with great stories to be shared and enjoyed by anyone, anywhere and anytime. Storytel is a digital platform provider as well as a comprehensive publishing group. The streaming business area offers subscriptions for audiobooks and e-books under the Storytel and Mofibo brands. Storytel's publishing business area is carried out through the publishing houses Norstedts, Massolit, StorySide, Printz Publishing, People's Press, Rabén & Sjögren, B.Wahlströms, Gummerus Kustannus and Norstedts Kartor. Ztory - a subscribed digital read-all-you-can streaming service for newspapers and magazines, is part of Storytel since January 2019. Storytel operates in 20 markets around the globe and is headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden.
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SOURCE Storytel