Exclusive: Amazon NY to sell its ebooks through B&N, Kobo, other retailers

Amazon’s New York-based book publishing imprint, which is headed by publishing industry vet Larry Kirshbaum, has signed a deal with Ingram to distribute its ebooks to other retailers, paidContent has learned. Amazon has confirmed the news.

Amazon New York is publishing its first list this fall. Feature titles include Timothy Ferriss’s The 4-Hour Chef and Penny Marshall’s My Mother Was Nuts.

The deal, through Ingram’s digital distribution arm CoreSource, will make Amazon New York titles available through other digital bookstores like Barnes & Noble Nook and Kobo. Titles from Amazon’s West Coast imprints are not included.

Amazon already makes a couple of its ebooks available through other retailers. Barnes & Noble previously stated that it would not carry Amazon Publishing print titles in its physical stores, in part because it was not allowed to sell the digital editions. Now that Barnes & Noble will have access to the ebooks as well, I’ve asked the company if it is going to change its policy.

A quick search through Barnes & Noble and Kobo’s websites this morning did not yet turn up Amazon NY titles. For example, one of the early titles on Amazon NY’s fall list – Outside In: The Power of Putting Customers at the Center of Your Business by Harley Manning and Kerry Boche — is available through Amazon as a print book and an ebook. Outside In is only available as a print book on Barnes & Noble’s site, and it is not available as an ebook on Kobo. I have asked Ingram for a statement and will update this post when I hear back.



GigaOM