In our early days, we lived and worked together in Bali and Peru. These days, Publishizer is headquartered in Amsterdam, with offices in New York and Michigan.
Co-founder & CEO
Lee has spent the past six years merging technology with book publishing as a literary agent and entrepreneur. His recent book deals include The Business of Influence by marketing podcaster Neal Schaffer (HarperCollins), That One Cigarette by award-winning Hollywood screenwriter Stu Krieger (Harvard Square Editions), Live Big by investor and business coach Ajit Nawalkha (BenBella Books), and Arthritis Foodie by Instagram influencer Emily Johnson (Hachette).
Co-founder & CTO
Tobias is a book and music lover. And he loves great and reliable solutions on the web, that’s why he built the Publishizer app right from the beginning. Being a full stack developer and project lead for over a decade now he’s always looking for the right technologies to push Publishizer forward.
Editorial Assistant
Clara is a student and deputy editor for the University of San Francisco literary magazine, the Ignatian. They edit and publish poetry, non-fiction, and fiction stories. She is studying English literature and pursuing a minor in journalism, and is fluent in both English and Spanish. Clara’s favorite short story is Sonny’s Blues by James Baldwin and her current favorite fiction novel is Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. She believes stories and books have the power to change the world. In her free time, she loves to play the piano and garden.
Back Office
Hemant ensures our authors are paid and workflows from campaign to funds transfer runs smoothly. His work is non-client-facing and his day-to-day is made up of payment settlements, record maintenance, compliance, bookkeeping, and keeping our numbers in line. His favorite book is Dune by Frank Herbert.
As a literary agency, technology platform, and non-traditional approach to publishing deals, Publishizer gives up royalties to focus on data and pre-orders. We are avid book lovers who live by three values:
Educate - authors about the publishing industry and what it takes to get their books out there to a niche readership.
Support - our customers during the book proposal writing and positioning process and during pre-order campaigns.
Innovate - the industry using technology to improve the way books are getting discovered by traditional publishers.
Publishizer started as a crowdfunding platform for books, and was soon accepted into the 500 Startups accelerator in Mountain View, California. Publishizer, Inc. was born on May 22, 2015.
We realized early on that authors were stuck between a rock and a hard place: traditional publishing rejected 96% of book ideas, but self-publishing was both insanely expensive and didn’t help great books get discovered. Publishers started taking notice of our authors, who were raising substantial amounts of money through pre-orders, and were able to offer authors a fairer deal. Our New York City office was opened in Brooklyn in 2017.
In 2018, Publishizer started landing traditional publishing deals for authors. With an injection of funding from Rockstart and Arches Capital in Netherlands, we opened our Amsterdam office. Publishizer BV was incorporated in March 2019.
Today, Publishizer is helping more books get published by publishers all over the world. We are passionate about book ideas and helping authors realize their dreams of publishing a book and sharing a message with the world. The publishing industry is a giant machine but lacks care for new and experienced authors. This is where Publishizer is working tirelessly to fill the gap. Join us!