News

Pfund to Head Oxford University Press Academic Unit
Calvin Reid -- 10/2/00
Pfund:
Lots of plans
for OUP.
Niko Pfund, former director and editor-in-chief of New York University Press, has been named publisher of Oxford University Press USA's academic division.
Pfund's appointment is the latest of several personnel moves at OUP since Edward Barry stepped down as president earlier this year (News, Feb. 28) and was succeeded by former OUP publisher Laura Brown.

Pfund told PW that OUP's U.S. academic division has about $30 million in gross annual sales, publishes more than 250 titles a year and distributes domestically about 1,000 titles from OUP's global publishing operations. Pfund said he expects to continue efforts he began while at NYU Press to acquire and market "the smart academic book that has an effect on its field and can be a midlist trade hit." He is also particularly excited about the potential of print-on-demand technology. "OUP has an active backlist of more than 18,000 titles and an inactive backlist of tens of thousands. With POD, we can breath new life into thousands of books."

Pfund also revealed plans to launch a professional publishing division. OUP already has a professional program that currently has $5 million in annual sales, he noted. "It's been subsumed in the academic division until now," said Pfund, who told PW that longtime OUP editor Joan Bossert has been promoted to associate publisher of the new professional division. In addition Paul Donnelly, formerly with Routledge, has been named senior editor in the division.