Try over a new weapon

Bookstores are reaching for a new weapon in their battle with booksellers on the Web: machines that print books on demand. BORDERS GROUP Inc., in a deal to be announced Tuesday, has taken a minority stake in an Atlanta start-up company called Sprout Inc. that will eventually let the chain_s stores print high-quality paperbacks in the store in about 15 minutes. "Making a book will be no more difficult than making a latte at Starbucks," brags Sprout_s 30-year-old co-founder, Henry Topping. The pact will allow Borders, the nation_s second-largest book chain, to have immediate access to older or obscure titles it wouldn_t otherwise carry. "We think there_s a lot of untapped demand in this out-of-print market," says Rick Vanzura, president of Borders_ new- media division, which lags behind Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble Inc. in Web bookselling. Borders will initially place a print-on-demand center at its La Vergne, Tenn., distribution site in the coming months to make sure the technology works. Next year, the chain hopes to roll out print-on-demand at individual stores, depending on its popularity. Neither company would disclose terms of the deal...