Dr. Martina Erdmann founded the company Antike (www. verlag-antike.de), a Berlin-based publisher specializing in research literature, in 2004. While working on her PhD in classical philology, for which she received a grant from the FAZIT Stiftung, she gained practical experience in publishing by completing a traineeship at C.H. Beck, and internships at Wilhelm Heyne Verlag and the Agnes Krup Literary Agency in New York. Dr. Erdmann also worked at Agence Hoffman in Munich, where she was in charge of contracts, and at Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft in Darmstadt, where she was the editor in charge of the classical studies program.

Verlag Antike: Modern times

New technological products – in this case, e-books – can only be fi nanced if investments are quickly followed by revenue and profi t. At the moment that is not what is happening. Due to its compact structure and budget, my one-woman publishing company can serve as a concise case study for the factors that need to be considered and the decisions that need to be made when it comes to developing e-books. My company successfully produces quality pBooks for specifi c target groups.

So why am I considering going into e-books?

My main objective is to collect high-quality data that can be applied to production processes and sales channels in the future. The money I save by using current production processes that are less storage-intensive can fi nance typesetting in XML. This creates a foundation to justify future e-products from a cost-accounting perspective – as the welcome side effect of more effi cient processes. The XML data can then be used to create independent products with tangible additional benefi t in terms of function and content. If we want to sell these products, however, the market needs to be developed further. I believe the following concept could be a solution: offering the same content in separate formats (printed and electronic), divided up by chapter or text into independent units that can be combined as desired, and using a clear price structure.
Verlag Antike: Modern times [PDF, 4300KB]