PVPF 2024

Spines, an AI Book Publishing Platform, has Raised $6.5 Million to Challenge the Centuries-old Business

Discover how Spines, an AI-powered book publishing platform, is disrupting traditional publishing with a $6.5 million investment.
on Apr 11, 2024

Spines, an Israeli startup, aims to disrupt the centuries-old publishing sector after raising $6.5 million in seed funding today.

The investment was led by Aleph and included current investors M-Fund, LionTree LLC, and Dan Senor, co-author of the best-seller "Startup Nation." Spines, officially known as Boox Publishing Technologies Inc., has developed an artificial intelligence-powered publishing platform for authors that automates the entire book-publication process, including physical copy distribution.

According to the company, the publishing sector has been at a standstill for decades, with current processes being virtually totally manual.

As a result, it takes the average publisher several months to prepare books for distribution and sale. Despite the proliferation of online books and e-readers, authors still have limited alternatives for self-publishing their books, and those who do succeed struggle to profit from their efforts.
Using Spines' platform, authors can self-publish their works in as little as two weeks, saving up to 30% on publishing costs.

Spines employs artificial intelligence to automate much of the publication process. It has created a number of algorithms that can handle critical duties such as editing, proofreading, formatting, and cover design, but authors can also pay an additional fee for a human editor.

In any event, each book is allocated a human production manager who will oversee the entire process and guide authors through each stage, from the moment they upload their work until the book is released.

Spines' AI-powered proofreader checks the document for grammatical faults, spelling mistakes, and typos to ensure that the final edition is error-free. The software also formats the book to industry standards, preparing it for distribution through a vast network of global outlets.

The platform goes a step further, with a generative AI model "reading" the final book before producing appropriate graphics for the front and back covers, with over 70 options for the author to pick from. Furthermore, Spines manages distribution, listing each book across more than 100 outlets once its published.

Users can also gain access to more powerful AI-powered marketing tools to increase the chances of their books' success, and the platform provides royalty management tools to help authors track book sales. Spines charges a 30% commission on all book revenue, with the author keeping the remaining 70%.

Furthermore, authors are not limited to online sales; they can order hard copies of their books for distribution in physical locations.

Spines now only supports English-language novels, but it can supply quotes for professional human translations into a variety of other languages. The business also stated that authors can pay an additional fee to make an audiobook version of their title.

The company has been around for a few years prior to today's investment round, and in that time it has grown to become one of Israel's biggest publishers, accounting for 15% of all books released in the nation during the last decade. Last year, it published more than 500 new titles, and with its growth into the United States, it expects it will have 3,000 published books by the end of the year - an average of nine books each day, comparable to many prominent traditional publishers.

According to Aleph Partner Michael Eisenberg, publishing is an age-old business ripe for disruption by artificial intelligence.

"Spines leverages all AI advances to make an old industry much more efficient, available to more customers and better at its job," stated Mr. Spines. "As an author, I can tell you that the current book publishing process is expensive, painful and long."

Spines founder and CEO Yehuda Niv stated that today's investment is a major milestone for the company and will assist to broaden the market availability of its platform, giving a technological alternative to the costly and inefficient status quo.

The monies will be utilized to increase Spines' brand awareness and improve the AI publishing process. "We look forward to working with this group of top investors and authors as we continue our expansion amongst self-publishing, bolster our offering, and allow an increasing number of authors to focus on what they love most — telling their stories," he said.