Amazon Remains Unconcerned Regarding Increased Competition For The Kindle
Posted by myarticlenetwork on March 10, 2010
The Amazon Kindle e-book reader has proven itself to be the perfect product for Amazon. Considering that Amazon has such a strong association with both books and electronics the Kindle is a great fit for the Amazon business model.
During 2009, e-book readers in general, and especialy the Kindle, became the hot “must have” gadgets of the year. It looks like sales will continue to grow at a very rapid rate throughout 2010. The market is still very new and is changing and developing at great speed.
At the moment, the Kindle reader is the leader of the pack. It currently enjoys a 60% share of the U.S. e-book reader market. Sony is in second place with a creditable 35% share. There are a whole host of competitors who have now developed their own e-book readers in order to get a piece of the action in what looks like being a large and profitable market.
It’s a compliment to Amazon, albeit a back-handed one, that practically every new e-book reader that displays any potential is immediately given the title of the “Kindle Killer”. However, bearing in mind that the Kindle is now Amazon’s number one selling product, you can be sure that Amazon will be fighting tooth and nail to see off challengers for the top slot.
Amazon has reacted swiftly to the increased competition by reducing the price of the Kindle 2.0 from its $ 359 February 2009 launch level to $ 259. The price of the Kindle DX, which probably has less competition right now, remains unchanged at $ 489. There have also been firmware updates, including the addition of pdf support and extended battery life, among others.
Amazon has also now released both the Kindle 2.0 and the DX in more than 100 countries worldwide. In reality, Amazon could probably sell Kindles in the States as fast as it could manufacture them – but establishing a global presence is probably a very smart move in the long term.
Over and above developing the Kindle itself and expanding into new markets, Amazon continues to increase the choice of Kindle books available on its Kindle store. There are currently over 400,000 titles available – and this number is growing at an average rate of 500 each and every day.
So, whilst there are a huge number of manufacturers frantically developing e-book readers in order to break into the market, Amazon probably has good reason to feel quietly confident. Instead of just focusing on development of the hardware, Amazon continues to advance on a broad front. They continue to develop the existing Kindle, adjust prices, increase the size of their potential market, expand the selection of available books and generally capitalise on their strong market leadership position. Whenever they decide to release the Kindle 4 – expect to see it sometime in 2010 – they will simply consolidate their leadership position even further.
