Dorling Kindersley Limited (branded as DK) is a British multinational

publishing Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, newsp ...

company specialising in illustrated reference books for adults and children in 63

languages Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of met ...

. It is part of Penguin Random House, a subsidiary of German media conglomerate

Bertelsmann Bertelsmann SE & Co. KGaA () is a German private multinational conglomerate corporation based in Gütersloh, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is one of the world's largest media conglomerates, and is also active in the service sector ...

. Established in 1974, DK publishes a range of titles in genres including travel (including DK Eyewitness travel), history, geography, science, space, nature, sports, gardening, cookery and parenting. The worldwide co-CEOs of DK is Paul Kelly and Rebecca Smart. DK has offices in New York, Melbourne, London, Munich, New Delhi, Toronto, Madrid, Beijing, and Jiangmen. DK works with licensing partners such as Disney,

LEGO Lego ( , ; stylized as LEGO) is a line of plastic construction toys that are manufactured by The Lego Group, a privately held company based in Billund, Denmark. The company's flagship product, Lego, consists of variously colored interlocking ...

DC Comics DC Comics, Inc. (doing business as DC) is an American comic book publisher and the flagship unit of DC Entertainment, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery. DC Comics is one of the largest and oldest American comic book companies, with their f ...

, the Royal Horticultural Society, MasterChef, and the Smithsonian Institution. DK has commissioned Mary Berry,

Monty Don Montagu Denis Wyatt Don (born George Montagu Don; 8 July 1955) is a British horticulturist, broadcaster, and writer who is best known as the lead presenter of the BBC gardening television series '' Gardeners' World''. Born in Germany and rai ...

, Robert Winston, Huw Richards, and

Steve Mould Steve Mould (born 5 October 1978) is a British educational YouTuber, author, and science presenter who is most notable for making science-related educational videos on his YouTube channel. Early life Mould was born on 5 October 1978 in Gatesh ...

for a range of books.

History

DK was founded in 1974 by

Christopher Dorling Christopher Dorling is the co-founder of Dorling Kindersley, a publishing company, along with Peter Kindersley. He was educated at Leighton Park School Leighton Park School is a co-educational Independent school (United Kingdom), independent sch ...

and

Peter Kindersley Peter Kindersley (born 1941) is the co-founder of the publishing company Dorling Kindersley and ran it with Christopher Dorling from 1974, until he sold his family stake for £105m in 2000. The firm's illustrated non-fiction reference books for ad ...

in London as a book packager. Its first book as a publisher in the UK was ''First Aid Manual'' for the British voluntary medical services. DK Inc. began publishing in the United States in 1991. That same year, Microsoft bought a 26 percent stake in DK. In 1996, DK hired Neal Porter, Richard Jackson and Melanie Kroupa from Orchard Books to start the DK Ink imprint, but Grolier sued the trio. DK and Grolier settled the lawsuit. In 1999, DK overestimated the market for ''

Star Wars ''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop-culture Cultural impact of S ...

'' books and was left with millions of unsold copies, resulting in crippling debt. As a direct result, DK was taken over the following year by the

Pearson plc Pearson plc is a British multinational corporation, multinational publishing and education company headquartered in London, England. It was founded as a construction business in the 1840s but switched to publishing in the 1920s.J. A. Spende ...

media company and made part of Penguin Group, which also owned the Penguin Books label. DK has continued to sell ''Star Wars'' books after the takeover. In 2013, Bertelsmann and Pearson completed a merger to form Penguin Random House. Bertelsmann owned 53% and Pearson 47% of the company. Penguin's trade publishing activity continued to include DK under the newly formed Penguin Random House. In July 2017, Pearson agreed to sell a 22% stake in the business to Bertelsmann, thereby retaining a 25% holding. In December 2019, Bertelsmann agreed to acquire Pearson's 25% in Penguin Random House, and therefore DK, making it a wholly owned subsidiary of Bertelsmann. In 2019, Prima Games was sold to Asteri Holdings.

Publications

DK publishes a range of titles internationally for adults and children. Most of the company's books are produced by teams of editors, designers and cartographers who work with freelance writers and illustrators. Some are endorsed by "imprimaturs": such as the

British Medical Association The British Medical Association (BMA) is a registered trade union for doctors in the United Kingdom. The association does not regulate or certify doctors, a responsibility which lies with the General Medical Council. The association's headquar ...

, the Royal Horticultural Society and the British Red Cross.

BradyGames

BradyGames was a publishing company in the United States operating as a DK imprint, which specializes in video game

strategy guides Strategy guides are instruction books that contain hints or complete solutions to specific video games. The line between strategy guides and walkthroughs is somewhat blurred, with the former often containing or being written around the latter. Str ...

, covering multiple video game platforms. It published its first strategy guide in November 1993 as a division of

MacMillan Computer Publishing Macmillan Publishers (occasionally known as the Macmillan Group; formally Macmillan Publishers Ltd and Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC) is a British publishing company traditionally considered to be one of the 'Big Five' English language publi ...

. In 1998, Simon & Schuster (which acquired Macmillan in 1994) divested BradyGames as part of its educational division to

. BradyGames has grown to publish roughly 90-100 guides per year. On 1 June 2015, BradyGames merged with Prima Games, and future strategy guides made by the publishing company were published under the Prima Games label, which was sold to Asteri Holdings in 2019.

Young adult

DK commenced publishing books aimed at teens with the release of ''Heads Up Psychology'' in 2014.

References

External links