亚马逊推出纸质教科书租赁业务

Amazon.com has launched a textbook rental service, allowing US students to borrow print editions for a school term at up to 70 per cent off the price of new titles, but the education industry is expecting the growth of rentals to slow.

亚马逊(Amazon)推出一项教科书租赁服务，允许美国学生每学期能以不超过新书售价70%的价格租用纸质教科书，但教育行业预计租赁业务的增长将会放缓。

Book Industry Study Group research found that textbook rentals rose last year from 8 per cent of the market to 11 per cent, with a corresponding drop in new textbook sales, from 59 per cent to 55 per cent. There is also a sizeable second-hand market in textbooks.

美国图书工业研究会(Book Industry Study Group)的研究表明，教科书租赁在整个教科书市场所占的份额已由去年的8%上升至11%，而新教科书销售的份额则相应从59%降至55%。此外，二手教科书市场的规模也相当可观。

Student Monitor, another research group, put rentals' penetration of the print textbook market at 13 per cent last year. Cengage, one of the largest US college publishers, predicted that this could double to 26 per cent by 2017 before flattening out.

另一家研究集团Student Monitor的调查显示，去年租赁对纸质教科书市场的渗透率达到13%。美国最大的高校教材出版商之一圣智学习出版公司(Cengage)预测，到2017年该比率可能翻一番，达到26%，之后增长将趋于平缓。

However, Cengage also forecast that rentals' impact on higher education revenues would fall from 5.2 per cent this year to just 0.8 per cent by 2017. "We're beginning to see textbook rentals peak," said Laura Ricci of Outsell, a publishing research firm.

然而，圣智学习出版公司也预测，到2017年，租赁在高等教育营收中的份额将由今年的5.2%下降至0.8%。出版研究公司Outsell的劳拉•瑞西(Laura Ricci )表示，"我们将开始看到教科书租赁达到顶峰。"

This is because publishers are increasingly using technology to enrich traditional textbooks, and students are finding it easier to sell their used texts online.

这是因为，出版商正越来越多地利用技术手段使传统教科书变得丰富多彩，而学生们也发现在网上出售二手书变得更容易。

"Users are beginning to expect more from textbook content [than] just words on a page," she said, pointing to the rise of interactive testing technology and other "full course solutions" as publishers such as Pearson, owner of the Financial Times, broaden their business models.

瑞西表示，"消费者开始希望教科书的每一页不仅出现文字，还要提供更多的内容。"她所指的是，随着英国《金融时报》的母公司培生集团(Pearson)等出版商拓宽其业务模式，交互测试技术和其他"全课程解决方案"正在兴起。

Existing textbook rental companies such as Chegg and BookRenter.com are diversifying, Ms Ricci added, saying they need not be threatened by Amazon.

瑞西补充道，齐格网(Chegg)和BookRenter.com等现有教科书租赁公司正在开展多元化经营，它们未必会受到亚马逊的威胁。

Mehdi Maghsoodnia, chief executive of BookRenter.com, welcomed Amazon's move, saying it would increase awareness of textbook rental services. BookRenter.com and Chegg offer similar discounts to Amazon.

BookRenter.com首席执行官麦迪•马苏德尼亚(Mehdi Maghsoodnia)对亚马逊此举表示欢迎。他表示，这将提高人们对教科书租赁服务的认识。该网站和Chegg提供与亚马逊类似的折扣。

"It's a recognition that the reality is that 99 per cent of the educational market continues to use physical texts," he said: "To help students, given the increase in tuition fees, you have to lower the cost of textbooks."

"我们承认，实际情况是99%的教育市场将继续使用实物教科书，"他表示，"要帮助学生，鉴于目前学费上涨的幅度，你必须降低教科书价格。"

According to the National Association of College Stores, US students spend on average $655 a year on required course materials. Multiplied by roughly 20m students in college, that suggests a $13bn market, BookRenter noted.

根据全国大学商店协会(National Association of College Stores)的数据，美国大学生每年在规定教材方面的平均支出为655美元。BookRenter指出，把这个数字乘以大约2100万大学生，说明市场规模为130亿美元。

Mr Maghsoodnia said by some estimates rental could grow to be half of the market by volume, although such a shift would reduce the overall market's value in dollar terms.

马苏德尼亚(Maghsoodnia)表示，根据一些估计，租赁业务可能将占到这一市场的一半，尽管这一转变可能会降低以美元计算的整体市场价值。

Several publishers have worked with print and digital rental services. McGraw-Hill and Chegg announced a partnership in 2009, and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt announced a deal on Tuesday with Kno, an education software company, offering year-long digital rentals of school texts for $9.99 or less per book.

几家出版商已经在纸质和数字租赁服务上采取合作。2009年，麦格劳希尔集团(McGraw-Hill)与齐格网建立合作关系。周二，霍顿-米夫林哈考特集团(Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)也宣布与教育软件公司Kno合作，以每本9.99美元甚至更低的价格提供为期一年的学校教科书数字租赁服务。

Many college students still find that selling their print textbooks once they have finished with them is cheaper than buying or renting their digital equivalents, Outsell reported this year.

研究机构Outsell今年表示，很多大学学生仍然认为完成课程之后出售纸质教科书要比购买或者租赁电子版教科书划算。