Digital reading subscription service Scribd has raised a $58 million round of funding led by Spectrum Equity. The new funding round brings the total amount of money raised by Scribd to $106 million.
Scribd launched in 2007 as a hosting service for digital documents, and has since evolved into a subscription service for e-books, audio books and magazines. The company announced in early 2019 that it had surpassed 1 million subscribers. Its website attracts some 100 million visitors a month, and readers have spent a total of over 190 million hours reading on the platform, the company said Monday.
“By partnering with the world’s best publishers of all types of content, Scribd has introduced a first-of-its-kind experience for readers, while unlocking a new revenue stream for the publishing community,” said Scribd founder and CEO Trip Adler in a statement. “This funding will enable us to continue to operate sustainably and efficiently while accelerating our growth, product innovations, content acquisition and continued investment in our employees.”
By combining e-books and magazines under one monthly plan, Scribd is effectively competing with both digital bookstores like the ones operated by Amazon and Google as well as news subscription services like Apple News Plus. In fact, Scribd did partner with the New York Times last year to launch a dedicated plan that offers access to both the Times website as well as the Scribd book and magazine catalogue.