A New Chapter

S. Chand And Co., one of India’s oldest publishers, is ready with a slew of apps and digital initiatives to face a future that it believes will be a blend of offline and online.

- Arnika Thakur

THE DEATH KNELL FOR PRINT has been sounded many a time since the advent of the Internet. It has only become louder with the proliferation of news websites, the availability of educational content on the Internet, and the rising preference of people to consume news and entertainment through mobile phones and tablets. But the fact is print is alive—maybe not kicking, but alive.

In schools and colleges, too, the use of digital tools to teach and learn is on the rise across the world through the use of textbooks has not died out. In India, however, the textbook industry is doing well. Look at S. Chand And Co., one of India’s oldest and largest textbook publishers. The New Delhi-based company’s revenue from the kindergarten-Class 12 (K-12) segment logged a compound annual growth of 33.5% from 83.9 crore in FY12 to 635.5 crore in FY18.

However, there is no question that digital is the future and so industry majors are adding digital products to their portfolio in an effort to insulate themselves from the threat of new-age companies such as Byju’s disrupting them and eating into their business. “It could happen in five years, it could happen in 30 years, but you have to be prepared for that. Participating in the digital ecosystem is not an option anymore, it’s a compulsion,” says Rohit Dokania, research analyst, IDFC Securities.