It has been observed that the international publishing industry is earning revenues through the licensing of copyrighted books and academic works for artificial intelligence (AI). Some agreements entered into by global publishers indicate how the global publishing industry is leveraging its business potential while addressing issues of copyright protection.

As per a report published by Seoul Economic Daily, US academic publisher Wiley has earned more than $100 million till date, in total AI-related revenues as on June 2026. It has formed partnerships with AI companies such as Anthropic, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Perplexity, and OpenEvidence.

Wiley Embraces Subscription-Based Licensing Approach

A subscription-based approach has been adopted by Wiley, which permits AI firms to gain access to specialized academic materials offered by Wiley as well as to obtain updates as more research is done. The subscription model ensures that there is a continuous business relationship between the publisher and the developer of the AI.

There has been an increasing demand for validated academic materials that have enabled the academic publishers to emerge as significant sources of training material for AI. The research publications and specialized knowledge serve as a structured source of information.

Author Participation in AI Licensing Agreements at HarperCollins

In addition to its pursuit of AI licensing agreements, trade publishing firm HarperCollins has reportedly made an AI deal with Microsoft with respect to nonfiction books.

According to the report, the licensing agreement grants authors the option to opt into the agreement, whereupon the publisher seeks individual consent from each author. The license reportedly lasts for roughly three years with a licensing cost of roughly $5,000 per book, which is equally shared by the publisher and the author.

Another feature of the licensing agreement is a limitation on the amount of text that may be reproduced in the AI outputs from the original text of the book.

Bloomsbury to Gain Over $21M from Copyright Damages

In addition to the licensing deals, copyright lawsuits are forming yet another path that may enable publishers to be compensated for the use of their products.

The Bloomsbury publishing company, famous for the Harry Potter series, will be gaining over $21 million in damages after reaching a resolution in the case of copyright infringement of Bartz v. Anthropic. According to the report, 14,087 books have been included into the calculations of damages.

Nonetheless, copyright damages obtained in a lawsuit cannot be compared to the fees obtained through licensing an AI.

Book Licences Developed in South Korea

There are also companies that arrange licensing deals between the publishers and the AI companies in South Korea.

An AI licensing platform called Mentat launched in 2025 has allegedly signed deals with about 90 publishers, acquiring the rights to over 34,000 titles. The company acts as a mediator, negotiating deals with AI companies on behalf of participating publishers and has allegedly signed deals totaling about 15 billion South Korean won.

This move is indicative of the attempt to develop a more structured process for licensing books to be used by AI.

Copyright Protection and Just Remuneration Are Major Concerns

While AI companies look for access to more book collections, there is still ongoing discussion about consent, clarity, remuneration, and scope of allowed usage.

Small publishing houses can experience difficulties when negotiating with huge technology companies due to a limited amount of resources and bargaining power. In order to solve this issue, the industry is looking for licensing schemes which would address the question of usage of works and distribution of revenue between publishers and authors.

A wide variety of licensing schemes demonstrates the importance of AI-related rights in the context of publishing business. The task that needs to be accomplished is creating the licensing schemes allowing technological progress and protecting the rights of book creators and publishers.