Sabre Foundation, Inc., founded in 1969, is a public charity devoted to the philosophy and practice of free institutions. Its projects in recent years have focused on the donation of English-language books and the support of education, private sector development, and higher learning. Most of its activities have been conducted in Eastern Europe and the countries of the former Soviet Union.

Since 1991, Sabre has offered a translation and publication program to respond to an expressed need for local-language editions of U.S. and U.K. books in the countries where it is active. As requested by its partner organizations in those countries, or by would-be financial sponsors, Sabre is prepared to:

Assist in the selection of titles in various fields of interest;

Assemble and review cost forecasts, price and sales projections, distribution plans and timetables, from information furnished by the partner organization;

Prepare, or assist in the preparation of, funding proposals for submission to foundations and other potential sources of funding;

Negotiate with the original publishers rights agreements for the translation and publication of foreign language editions;

Conclude such agreements as agent on behalf of the partner organization (or its local publishing partner), and disburse the agreed fees or advances;

Communicate the principles and terms of such agreements to the partner organization and assure that they are fully understood, in some cases, by conducting seminars on intellectual property rights in the foreign partner location; and

Monitor the scheduled performance of the project and report to the funder.

Sabre's first project, in 1991-92, involved the translation into Polish of a group of basic business books, to respond to a demand from entrepreneurs and small business people throughout Poland for information on the rudiments of economics, organization and management, planning and budgeting, marketing, advertising, finance, etc. Sabre's partner organizations were the Miroslaw Dzielski Institute of Commerce and Industry of the Krakow Industrial Society and Znak, a well-established Krakow publishing firm. The texts of the books in this "Introduction to Business" series were adapted to the Polish setting and were presented in an attractively-designed paperback format, priced within the reach of a wide audience. The shortfall between costs and revenues in the 10,000-copy initial print run of each title was funded by a grant from the William H. Donner Foundation of New York.

Your Small Business Made Simple, by Richard Gallagher (Doubleday, New York)

Do Your Own Market Research, by Paul Hague and Peter Jackson (Kogan Page Limited, London)

Economics in One Lesson, by Henry Hazlitt (Crown Publishers, New York)

The Greatest Little Business Book, by Peter Hingston (Hingston Associates, Perthshire, Scotland)

The Greatest Sales and Marketing Book, again by Peter Hingston (Hingston Associates, Perthshire, Scotland)

In 1993 the Donner Foundation awarded a second grant to Sabre and its Polish partners to extend the series to the translation of five additional U.S. and U.K. business books. Negotiations are now underway to acquire the rights to the new titles selected by the Poles.

Based on the success of the Polish project, the Donner Foundation has agreed to provide funding for a similar project in Ukraine, where Sabre's local partner is its affiliated non-profit foundation, Sabre-Svitlo, of L'viv. Working in conjunction with the L'viv Institute of Management, Sabre-Svitlo selected for initial publication the above five titles which had been so well received in Poland. Translations of these books will appear on the Ukrainian market and in business schools in 1994.

Sabre's Ukrainian business book translation project is being launched at a time when the laws and practices in the intellectual property field in the countries of the former Soviet Union are extremely unsettled. (Last summer Sabre-Svitlo learned of a plan to pirate some of the American and British books under consideration for its authorized Ukrainian translation program. A timely warning to the offending parties put an end to the scheme.) To improve local familiarity with the principles and pitfalls in the copyright and permissions field, and to insure that the terms of the rights contracts are fully understood by the Sabre-Svitlo team, Sabre Foundation is planning to conduct a workshop on the subject in L'viv in the spring.

Sabre welcomes inquiries from potential new foreign partners, or from sponsoring groups interested in participating in the funding of such translation and publication programs.

Charles Getchell,
Sabre's Publications Counsel,
P.O. Box 291
Ipswich, MA 01938
telephone 508/356-0541, fax 508/356-7322.