The Frankfurt Book Fair, held for the 60th time now since it was first held in 1949, is one of the world’s largest professional book fairs and is viewed as a large annual event for the international publishing industry. Digital publishing and digital reading trends have also been progressively flourishing based on an environment in which hardware and software are gradually becoming complete. This year(2010), the promotion program for the E-learning and digital archives industries has led industry operators grabbed this market opportunity by setting up a “Digital Publishing and Electronic Reading Zone” in the Taiwan Pavilion at the Frankfurt Book Fair in order to market Taiwan’s E-Learning and digital archiving content and E-Readers, displaying the software and hardware integration model promoted by the program. This aim was to use the power of integration to attract international buyers and help the industry win more international cooperation.

The direction of the event adopts the form of item exhibition and discussion so that participating exhibitors can take a proactive approach by arranging for meetings with prospective buyers during non-show interview times as well as displaying their products. Many traders proactively arranged for meetings with international publishers during the event while also actively collecting market information and participating in seminars of the main discussions topics. In response, many traders have expressed that although a proactive approach is more tiring than traditional approaches, the actual benefits derived are also higher. They have also noted that this approach contributes towards global understanding of the publishing ecology and is extremely beneficial for future planning decisions regarding company operations. As this was the first year the book fair has expanded its scope to include various “technology and content combined” themed technological zones and small introductory activities, digital publishing became the book fair’s main focus and Taiwan’s “Digital Publishing and Electronic Reading Zone,” was fully in tune with the trend of the event and became a focal point of media attention and buyer inquiries., setting a precedent for the Taiwan Pavilion as the centre of media attention and a favorite of the year, and has also garnering a high degree of international exposure for the traders in the industry.

Many international buyers have been attracted to visit and make inquiries during this exhibition. This includes buyers from: the United States, Japan, Korea, PRC, Mexico, Italy, Spain, Poland, Argentina, Poland, Argentina, Greece, Russia, Brazil, Romania, Croatia, Turkey, and more. Many professional publishers and traders in the industry have been hoping to expand into the field of digital publishing but have been unable to find suitable business partners. With this exhibition which displays the software and hardware as well as the integration of the platform and its services, this problem regarding international publishers can be solved. Many international buyers have requested in-depth discussions with some industry traders and we believe that with the quality of Taiwan’s industry traders’ goods and services, we should soon be seeing increasing occurrences of content licensing or international cooperation for the integration of software and hardware. Of the 14 event participants, there have been at least ten cases of international cooperation with international companies from the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain, Turkey, and China before the end of the year, and over US$3 million in international cooperation. There are also some industry operators that are still discussing international cooperation.

Through successful integrated packaging of software and hardware, the overseas promotion activities for this year have been brought to a successful close in a way which displays the innovative application of Taiwan’s ICT integration learning and digital archiving content so that content and hardware industry traders were able to highlight their different values to commercial application. In addition, industry traders have been able to establish a more international perspective on commercial models through discussions with various international publishers during this period, and will be a big help in terms of adjustments to be made to future international marketing strategy.