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T-Mobile and Vodafone stall Kindle launch in Germany
The launch of Amazon's e-book device, Kindle--which has taken 
the US market by storm--has been halted in Germany after talks broke down with T-Mobile and Vodafone. Amazon accused the two mobile operators of wanting excessive fees in return for supporting the device--the counter argument being that Amazon was offering too little.
Speculation that T-Mobile is looking to launch its own e-book device might not have helped negotiations.
This failure to reach an agreement in Europe's biggest book market comes after the German publishing industry said it would prevent e-books being sold at lower prices than their paper counterparts. The existing provider of e-book devices in Germany, Sony with its Reader unit, recently called for the book industry to price e-books at a 20 per cent discount to the hardcopy book price. But this again was rebuffed by many publishers insisting on the same price for a book in either form.
The convenience of the Kindle, which only works with an Amazon account, has helped it to its enormous success, whereas Sony's Reader device must be connected to a PC each time a new book or article is requested by the user. This month, Amazon released its third-generation Kindle, the DX, in the US.
For more on this story:
Engadget and Earth Times
Related stories:
Kindle may generate $2 ARPU, but is it really that bad?
Amazon promises Kindle content across more devices
Google takes on Amazon Kindle with mobile ebooks
Amazon optimizes Kindle Store for iPhone
Comments
Posted by Anonymous | July 2, 2009 - 12:13pm
Paul,
I'm always reading rhetoric about the Kindle, such as "taken the US market by storm" but in reality, I see relatively few Kindles out and about. While I like the device a great deal, and it is a seminal device for embedded wireless, does anybody actually have any sales data to back up the accepted fact that it is a "big success", or are we just repeating that which Amazon PR has told us?
best,
Derek Kerton
www.kertongroup.com
Posted by Paul Rasmussen | July 2, 2009 - 2:21pm
Good afternoon Derek.
Amazon has never released shipment details of the Kindle, only saying that it is the most popular electronic device on its web site (with the new DX version being #2). Some analysts claim that around 500k were shipped by the end of 2008, and the company has reported being sold out of stock on several occasions this year.
Interestingly, it also claims the device accounts for 35% of book sales (from over 300k titles) for those editions in which Kindle versions are available.
But these are expensive units – US$400 (US$500 for the DX) so volumes are not going to be huge today – but from a subjective viewpoint, those that use or have handled the device (which is all I’ve managed) are mightily impressed.
So, has it taken the US market by storm? For an e-book reader - in relative terms - yes.
However, Amazon is about to come under enormous pressure as other vendors/services look to enter the e-book market this year.
There is further comment/analysis on this web site http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=20473
BR Paul
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