Dutch publisher of Geert Mak and Sacha Bronwasser, among others, comes into American hands

Through the acquisition, Veen Bosch & Keuning (VBK) believes it will be able to offer its Dutch authors abroad more often in English, and Simon & Schuster (S&S) will sell its foreign titles more often and faster in the Netherlands. The two companies announced this on Monday afternoon. S&S, with authors such as Stephen King and Nicci French, becomes the full owner of VBK, which includes thirteen publishers – including Atlas Contact, Ambo|Anthos, Ten Have and Kok Boekencentrum. How much S&S will pay for the acquisition has not been disclosed. S&S was one of the few major American publishers not yet active in Europe.

“After five successful years, partly due to corona, we were faced with the question of how we as a publisher should approach digitalization and globalization,” says VBK general manager Geneviève Waldmann in an explanation. ‘The Netherlands is a small language area where one fifth of the books sold are currently in English, which is why we wanted to see where there are additional possibilities.’

The takeover should make it easier to publish Dutch-language books abroad from now on. Due to the popularity of English-language books, VBK is currently translating books by fifty authors, such as the Baantjer series, into English in order to sell them on the foreign market. Once the acquisition by S&S is completed and approved by competition authorities, such translated books will also be published by S&S’s subsidiaries in other countries.

New language area

After the first meetings with CEO Jonathan Karp at the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2023, the conversations gained momentum this spring. On rumors that VBK was also in discussions about a merger with WPG Uitgevers, owner of literary publisher De Bezige Bij, responds to Waldmann: ‘We always talk to everyone about our profession, but there was no question of an imminent merger between the two publishers.’

‘In the conversations with Karp I noticed that we had the same goals and challenges. “I have always been wary of owners outside our field, which is why we have such a good feeling about S&S, which comes from the same publishing industry,” says Waldmann.

With the acquisition of VBK, some of the oldest Dutch publishing houses come into American hands. Ten Have and Kok have existed since the late 19th century and the V in VBK Uitgevers comes from Lambertus Jacobus (LJ) Veen, born in 1863 and the publisher of Louis Couperus. The name LJ Veen is still in use as an imprint of Atlas Contact, the most literary of VBK’s publishing houses and the publishing house that has had a hard time in recent years. Like competitor De Bezige Bij, Atlas Contact dismissed editors and other employees due to declining turnover.

Writers’ Revolt in 2017

On Monday morning, employees of VBK and its sister companies Bookchoice and Thinium were informed, after which a number of writers were informed about the intended takeover. In 2017, a proposed change in ownership led to a writers’ revolt and the departure of publisher Mizzi van der Pluijm from Atlas Contact. Van der Pluijm started her own publishing company, VBK continued on the path of scaling up. In 2021, it founded VBK Audiolab, a podcast production company, and bought audiobook producer Thinium.

Waldmann is confident that there will be no unrest among authors this time. ‘I can imagine that writers want to know what such a takeover means, but I can tell them that we maintain our autonomy and identity and remain responsible for all choices. At our core, we remain a cluster of small-scale publishers.’

Shareholders bought out

The takeover should mainly make marketing, printing and digitalization more efficient, says Waldmann, who will remain ultimately responsible after the takeover. ‘In marketing we do not yet look much at data analysis, while this can be very useful for previously published books. We can learn a lot from S&S in this regard.’

As a result of the takeover, the old shareholders – including many VBK employees – will be bought out. S&S does plan to let employees buy shares again through a special program. “That leads to involvement in the company,” says Waldmann.