Del Rey Announces Manga Line-up

    July 16, 2003

(New York, July 16, 2003)Del Rey Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, announced today that it will launch a line of manga titles in conjunction with Kodansha, Japan's leading publisher of manga. This creative partnership is a direct result of the recent alliance between Random House, Inc. and Kodansha Ltd., Publishers, which was announced in January.







Del Rey will launch with the simultaneous release of four titles in Spring 2004. Each will be the first volume of an individual seriesall top Kodansha properties; these will be followed up by eight additional volumes over the next twelve months. The titles will be released as trade paperbacks printed in the traditional Japanese format, reading right to left. The target audience for the program will be readers 13 and older.







"We're terrifically excited about working with Kodansha, and about the potential for expanding the audience for manga," said Betsy Mitchell, VP/Editor-in-Chief for Del Rey. "Our program will mark the first time a major U.S. trade publisher has entered the manga arena. Random House's powerful sales, publicity, and promotional resources will bring manga to greater prominence in several markets that have not yet benefited from its current popularity."







Dallas Middaugh, former sales and marketing director for Viz, has been named as Director of Manga for Del Rey, reporting to Betsy Mitchell. He will oversee acquisitions as well as sales, marketing, and promotional strategies for the program. Widely respected as an expert in selling and marketing manga, Middaugh saw net revenue from manga publishing more than triple during his tenure at Viz.







Cited as the fastest growing category in bookstores today, the graphic novel market has doubled each year for the past two years, leading to an estimated $100 million market today. The vast majority of the growth in the market has been due to the increased popularity of Japanese comics, known as manga.







"We thank Kodansha for working with us to create this new program," said Mitchell. "It's exciting to be able to trade ideas and concepts."







About Del Rey Books:



Del Rey Books (http://www.delreydigital.com) was founded in 1977 as a division of Ballantine Books under the guidance of the renowned Judy-Lynn del Rey and her husband, Lester del Rey. Del Rey publishes the best of modern fantasy, science fiction and alternate history in hardcover, paperback, and now e-book formats. The Random House Publishing Group is a publishing group of Random House, Inc., the U.S. publishing company of Random House, the trade book publishing division of Bertelsmann AG, one of the world's leading international media companies.







About Kodansha Ltd., Publishers :



Kodansha is the largest trade book publisher in Japan. Founded in 1909, the company by virtue of its long history, the quality of its publishing, and its established network of sales and marketing is regarded as the trade book market leader in the publishing business in Japan. Moreover, Kodansha has been recognized as the leading publisher with a mission to introduce Japan through its publishing business.