The Kindle Shows the Way for the E-Book Market
Considering the very strong link that Amazon have with books and reading, it’s no surprise that the Amazon Kindle reader has proved itself to be a very good fit for Amazon’s business model. During 2009, e-book readers really took off. Much of the credit for that must be given to the Amazon Kindle, both the Kindle 2 and the Kindle DX which attracted a lot of publicity and did a great deal of work to bring e-book readers to the public’s attention.
Currently, the Kindle is Amazon’s number one selling product. It has a 60% share of the American e-book reader market – Sony is in second place with a 35% share. Both the Kindle 2 and DX model are now on sale in over 100 countries worldwide. There are a lot of new e-book readers, from a variety of different manufacturers, on the market now. However, there is little doubt that the Amazon Kindle is the market leader.
In a way, it’s a compliment to Amazon that every new reader which shows any promise whatsoever is immediately christened the “Kindle killer”. Amazon has responded to the increased competition level by reducing the price of the Kindle 2 by $100 to $259. At the moment, the price of the DX model is unchanged, but the recent introduction of the Apple iPad may see Amazon revising this price also in the near future.
In addition to developing the Kindle hardware and increasing the size of the available market, Amazon has also worked to ensure that the choice of Kindle books available continues to increase. Currently there are over 420,000 Kindle books to choose from and this number is being added to at an average rate of 500 new books daily.
In contrast to their competitors, who seem to be concentrating mainly on the development of e-book reader hardware, Amazon and making advances in a number of different areas. They are tweaking prices, releasing firmware updates for the existing Kindle models, growing their potential market and continually expanding the range of Kindle books on offer. In other words, not only are they capitalising on their dominant market position, but they are making the most of the strong association with books and reading.
It will be interesting to see what new developments are included when Amazon decide to release the next upgrade of the Kindle reader. This will give a very strong indication of the way that the e-book reader market is likely to develop in future. Different industry watchers are predicting various dates for the next Kindle update. Given that the Kindle 2 is now over a year old it is almost certain that this will take place in 2010. Some time during the third quarter of the year seems to be the most widely anticipated timeslot at the moment.
Read all about the Amazon Kindle for yourself – and have a look at the wide range of Kindle accessories available to let you personalise and protect your reader.
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