JK Rowling's Pottermore recovers sales by focusing on Harry Potter e-books

Pottermore, the digital venture of JK Rowling, has reported a recovery in sales. This follows its strategy to focus on selling Harry Potter e-books and audio books after shutting down its other verticals such as games and message boards.

Sony and JK Rowling had unveiled Pottermore in 2011, at which point the author had described it as a "new way" for fans to enjoy the Harry Potter series. However, the company's new strategy follows it cutting ties with its development and distribution partner Sony in September 2015, leading to the abandonment of its indicative features.

The London-headquartered company said its sales had doubled in three months and that it had sold more titles in the three-month run-up to Christmas than in the previous 12 months. This was attributed to its shift to more widespread distribution of digital Harry Potter e-books and audio books via channels such as Amazon, Apple and WHSmith among others. Pottermore is understood to have reaped in revenues of about £4.5m (€5.9m, $6.4m) in the last quarter of 2015.

While the company said that opening up its distribution will allow it to sell more Harry Potter titles in the current financial year than ever before, Pottermore, which lost revenues when its partnership with Sony ended, has still more time to go before it can make up for the same.

According to its accounting books, the company earned revenues of £7m for the year ending March 2015. This is a drop from the £31m it reported in 2014, when Sony paid advance royalties to meet a guaranteed minimum at the end of its agreement with Pottermore. However, the break up with Sony has resulted in the company's fortunes swinging from what should have been a pre-tax profit of £14.9m to a loss of £6m.