YouScribe, the largest digital reading library on the African continent with over one million subscribers, announces the launch of its services in Ghana in partnership with mobile payment expert Digital Virgo and MTN. This marks a significant turning point in the company's development, as it strengthens its presence in the English-speaking African market, underlining its commitment to making culture accessible in all regions of the continent.
The launch of YouScribe in Ghana is an important milestone for the library. The country becomes the 14th to welcome YouScribe, and the 2nd English-speaking country after South Africa. Thus, illustrating its development in the English-speaking part of the continent. Future readers will be able to take out a daily subscription for 0.75 GH₵, giving them access to a vast digital catalog comprising almost 200,000 English-language ebooks, numerous press titles, thousands of audiobooks and comic books, including titles from Wiley, Princeton, PanMacmillan, Canongate, de Gruyter, Elsevier, Springer and Panini (Marvels licenses). Digital Virgo, the specialist in mobile payment via telecom operator billing solutions, will support this growth through its digital technologies and acquisition strategies.
YouScribe founder and CEO Juan Pirlot de Corbion commented: "The launch of YouScribe in Ghana is an important and ambitious step in our aspiration to connect cultures through a multilingual digital library featuring authors from all over the continent. We are very proud to be able to promote Ghanaian culture on our library". YouScribe is actively collaborating with leading Ghanaian publishers such as Adaex Edu, Subsaharan Publishers, and distributor African Books Collective, to enrich the catalog with a selection of local content specially adapted to the Ghanaian public.
In line with this vision, Digital Virgo's Africa Head of Sales, Renaud Ganascia, says: "We are proud to be collaborating, in three countries already, with a leading African operator like MTN. We aspire to continue this collaboration with MTN and YouScribe to reach a large audience of mobile customers across the continent. This is a service that, beyond the engagement it generates, is particularly close to our hearts for its social and societal impact."
In the space of just four years, the number of readers subscribing to the YouScribe library has increased twenty-fold, exceeding 1.5 million readers worldwide. Over 95% of these readers are in Africa. What's more, Ghana's digital publishing sector is experiencing exceptional growth, with sales increasing 5x growth since 2018, reaching over 35 million US dollars by 2024. This dynamism is mainly driven by e-newspapers, digital books and magazines. With a projected 6.1 million users by 2027, Ghana represents a fast-growing market for YouScribe, which aspires to play a key role in this evolution thanks to the distribution of content in local languages and its accessibility strategy.
About YouScribe
With over a million books, audiobooks, press titles and educational digital documents in its catalog, and more than a million subscribers, YouScribe is the largest French-language digital library. This growth has enabled YouScribe to achieve sales of €11 million by 2023. Over 3,000 African and international publishers have contributed their catalogs. The offer is available in 3 languages (French, English, Arabic). The company won the Digital Africa Challenge, organized by AFD (Agence française de développement), French Tech and Bpifrance. YouScribe is backed by historical shareholders (Thierry Dassault, Iris Capital, Philippe van der Wees (Sodival), Charles Adriaenssen (Oaks), and in December 2021, by the Banque des Territoires (Caisse des Dépôts) as part of the France 2030 program.
For further information: www.youscribe.com
About Digital Virgo
Digital Virgo is a key partner for telecoms operators, specialising in payments and monetisation. Our range of solutions includes a robust payment management platform as well as a portfolio of high value-added services in various sectors such as entertainment, education, video-on-demand, music, eSports and gaming. Our offering includes standalone products, white label distribution, bundles, themed hubs, loyalty and gamification programs, as well as specific solutions to promote the use of operator billing with digital tickets, SMS donations and interactivity programs. Digital Virgo's added value lies in its ability to approach payments and monetisation in a holistic way, considering strategic aspects such as the customer journey, local adaptation, user acquisition, data management, as well as the regulatory and compliance framework. With operations in over 40 countries and a turnover of 430 million euros by 2022, our dedicated team of 860 professionals in over 30 offices worldwide reflects our commitment to operational efficiency. Digital Virgo has partnerships with over 140 telecoms operators and over 300 merchants, underlining our considerable reach and impact.
For further information : www.digitalvirgo.com
