Free The Global eBook Report: Current Conditions & Future Projections. Update October 2013 by Rüdiger Wischenbart Page B

were among the first. Much of the content available for the STM category originates outside the country. But in Social Sciences and the Humanities , a modest list of journals are being published in India, chiefly by Sage India , which publishes 50 journals in Humanities and Social Sciences. One of the largest distributors of e-resources to institutions and libraries in India, Balani Infotech , part of iGroup ( Asia Pacific Limited ), distributes a wide variety of electronic content — ebooks, PDF documents, audiobooks, ejournal issues, classic literature for K–12, and more — produced by over 200,000 publishers from around the world.
    Under the Government of India’s National Library and Information Services Infrastructure for Scholarly Content (N-LIST) of _INFLIBNET_ — the online digital library linking universities and colleges — nearly 80,000 e-books and thousands of high quality paid e-journals have been made available to research institutions, universities, and colleges across the country. Almost 90% of the ebooks in this network are sourced from the US-based Ebrary platform.
    The Indian Government has been investing in electronic content creation too. Elearning courses from the national premier technology institutions, the seven Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and the Bangalore-based Indian Institution of Science (IISc) are being offered as part of the National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL). The Ministry of Human Resource Development , Government of India, funds the NPTEL. The aim of the project is to enhance engineering education in the country. About 260 courseware modules were available in phase 1 in January 2013, from a total of 1216 proposed courses.
    The government’s One-Stop Education Portal , Sakshat , launched in 2006, is to become a repository of educational resources for teachers and learners — from kindergarten onwards. The portal houses virtual classrooms and self-learning materials. A work-in-progress, the portal aims to synergise the work by national-level educational bodies like UGC, AICTE, IGNOU, IISc, IIT, NCERT etc.
    India’s online education market size is valued at $20 billion and set to grow to $40 billion, according to an industry estimate. The current market size for digitized school products in private schools alone is around $500 million. Privately run schools account for 20% of all schools in India. The current market size for ICT in government schools is valued at $750 million, according to market research firm Technopak Advisors .
    The increasing use of computers in classrooms in the course of the last decade has enabled the private education sector (in K–12, higher education, academic) to develop and adopt elearning content. In the K–12 segment, publishers like Pearson and S. Chand Harcourt have a strong presence in producing elearning materials and teaching aids, alongside educational companies like Educomp Solutions , iDiscoveri , Everonn , CORE , and IL&FS etc. Software service providers like Tata Interactive Systems and HCL Infosystems have also entered the school elearning space through partnerships with content providers.
    The bundling of educational content with tablets is a growing trend. Micromax Funbook tablet has partnerships with publishers like McGraw Hill and Pearson , and with educational companies like Everonn Education and Vriti Education .
    On the other hand, publishers are also launching tablets with content bundling. Pearson Education India recently launched MX Touch , a tablet-based education solution for Indian schools, in November 2012. Available in three variants, the MX Touch tablets host interactive activities and worksheets compliant with the school syllabi for grades 3–8. One of India’s largest educational publishers, the S. Chand Group , has launched Intellitab , a tablet that works on Android 4.0, which packs in curriculum-based content for each grade. The content is based on S. Chand Harcourt’s Destination