The Bookseller reports that Samedaybooks has bought Country Bookshop, the online bookselling business and community website for 500,000 pounds. The deal does not include the shop, but does include Country Bookshop founder Sridhar Siddegowa, who will join the Samedaybooks management team in order to provide "strategic advice on e-commerce activities across the company".

It is Charles Denton's first acquisition since taking a controlling stake in the troubled retail business earlier this year. Denton, deputy chairman of Samedaybooks, said: "This is our first strategic investment to accelerate our expansion of the company. Countrybookshop.co.uk was a pioneer of online bookselling with a well established brand name, valuable technology, community website software and an extensive customer database. We quickly aim to integrate the business into the Samedaybooks platform to deliver a step change in our growth."

In other news, Kieron Smith, Waterstone's online commercial operations manager, is to join Samedaybooks as manager of the company's e-commerce operations in September. A replacement for Smith at Waterstone’s has not yet been named.