At a press conference Wednesday afternoon at the London Book Fair it was announced that the New York Rights Fair (NYRF) will become the official rights fair of BookExpo, starting this year. Reed Exhibitions, which owns BookExpo, will move the event’s rights center to NYRF, which will be held at the Metropolitan Pavilion located a short distance away from the Javits Center, the site of BookExpo. All of BookExpo’s rights oriented exhibitors will have the option to move to premium space at the NYRF or remain at the Javits.
The inaugural New York Rights Fair will run simultaneously with BookExpo, set for May 30 – June 1, in New York City. While the NYRF will be the center for all rights activity, BookExpo will continue to house all other events and programs that have been associated with the country’s largest publishing conference.
The NYRF is a collaboration between BolognaFiere, which runs the Bologna Children’s Book Fair, Publishers Weekly, and Combined Book Exhibit. The three parties, along with Reed Exhibitions, promise that the combined events will improve the overall experience for book professionals working with the U.S. publishing market. As part of the agreement, NYRF badge holders will have full access to the BookExpo exhibition floor, while BookExpo badge holders with a Rights badge designation will have full access to NYRF. Shuttle buses will travel between the two events.
“Through Publishers Weekly readers and clients, we found that there was an opportunity for two events,” said George Slowik, Jr., president of Publishers Weekly. “PW’s unique POV as a horizontal publication, serving the entire industry, paired with the unique relationships that we maintain with both Reed Exhibitions’ BookExpo and BolognaFiere enabled us to foster and develop a strong collaboration between the two events.”
Antonio Bruzzone, general director, BolognaFiere concurred and noted: “This relationship was born for the common goal of best serving the publishing industry. In our experience as organizers of the Bologna Children’s Book Fair we have always focused on the rights market, which is also the core of our engagement in the creation of NYRF. Today the partnership with BookExpo opens new and exciting opportunities to better support the dialogue between international and American publishing. We are looking forward to continuing to develop this relationship in years to come as we work together to benefit the industry.”
On behalf of Reed Exhibitions, Ed Several, senior v-p, said: “Over the past year, BookExpo has undergone a reimagination to offer more of the core values that attendees and exhibitors are looking for. We have been presenting this new vision to publishers here at the London Book Fair this week and so it is appropriate that we can announce this exciting new partnership here as well. We are thrilled to enter into this relationship with the New York Rights Fair and see this joint agreement as an opportunity to better serve the publishing industry.”
