Next Issue Media, the digital publishing venture of Condé Nast, Hearst, Meredith, News Corp. and Time Inc., has selected Vindicia’s CashBox billing platform to power the sale of its interactive magazine and newspaper content to consumers worldwide.

Options to be offered to consumers using the Vindicia CashBox platform will include digital subscriptions and single-copy sales, as well as integrated print/digital bundles delivered across the consumer electronics and ereading device landscape.

“Our focus at Next Issue Media is to deliver an immersive, interactive reading experience second to none across a wide variety of magazine and newspaper titles,” said Morgan Guenther, president/CEO of Next Issue Media, New York. “Our storefront will be capable of providing customers with multiple ways to access their favorite content—single-copy and subscription purchases, print-plus-digital bundles, cross-selling and up-selling, personalization, flex pricing, archival content and more.

“And [we plan] to deliver the most relevant real-time offers and product packages to customers who are already print subscribers and have a deep relationship with our brands,” he said. “All of this requires a state-of-the-art commerce engine that can quickly scale, both domestically and internationally, and can take advantage of the unique collection of assets we start with.

“That is why we chose to work with Vindicia as our partner.”

Founded by five leading global publishers, Next Issue Media is an end-to-end publishing platform designed to bring immersive, interactive magazine and newspaper content to consumers via touch-screen, high-resolution digital devices, including tablets and smartphones.

Through a digital newsstand populated with a curated selection of magazines and newspapers, consumers will be able to purchase single digital issues, digital subscriptions and print/digital bundles and download content to the device of their choice, all through a one-stop, one-click storefront.

Vindicia offers an on-demand billing platform for marketing and sales that manages subscriptions and one-time payments for digital merchants. Its clients include Symantec, Activision Blizzard, Intuit and Atari/Cryptic.

As an externally audited PCI Service Provider and a SAS 70 Type II company, Vindicia securely handles online revenue of more than a billion dollars annually.

What’s Next?
With $3 billion projected in subscription revenue from interactive periodicals by the year 2014, Next Issue Media is committed to bringing an economical ereading channel to consumers, publishers, advertisers and technology partners.

With offices in New York and Palo Alto, CA, Next Issue Media has developed an end-to-end publishing platform for the delivery of immersive, interactive periodicals through a unified digital storefront.

Mr. Guenther said that Vindicia’s subscription-selling expertise, coupled with the sophistication and scalability of their billing engine and international reach, make them a perfect fit for Next Issue Media’s service offerings.

Traditional media outlets have long sought ways to better monetize their content while the digital marketplace continued to expand at a dramatic pace.

Mr. Guenther believes that Vindicia’s team understands the challenges inherent in today’s marketplace—and that a digitally focused billing infrastructure is key to helping companies such as Next Issue Media and their publishing constituents succeed.

“CashBox supports a broad array of payment methods: credit and debit cards, PayPal, electronic checks, pre-paid cards and localized country payment methods,” said Sanjay Sarathy, senior vice president of marketing and business development at Vindicia, Belmont, CA.

“Boleto Bancario in Brazil and ELV—European Direct Debit—in Germany and Austria are two specific examples,” he said.

“CashBox is optimized for companies like NIM to support subscribers who access content on various devices including PCs, tablets and mobile devices.”

Final Take