American giant of e-commerce Amazon an industry leader in the United States, finally launches its Kindle digital ebook reader, priced at 99 euros and an accompanying Kindle Store.
Kindle, exclusively devoted to reading, will be offered for pre-order from Friday mid-day and shipped as of October 14, including Belgium, Switzerland, Luxembourg and Monaco.
Amazon opens along with a download store of books and digital newspapers, Kindle Store and offers free applications to view such content in other media.
With Christmas three months to go, the group will market it’s 4th generation of it’s kindle reader in France. But do not confuse with the Kindle Fire tablet recently unveiled by its parent company which also for films, music and internet.
"We have big ambitions," he told AFP the owner of Amazon France, Xavier Garambois without revealing his objectives. With a black and white colors choice, the Kindle weighs 170 grams. "This is the weight of a paperback book, which can carry a library of 1,400 titles in its memory," he said.
The French Kindle Store contains huge catalog with 800,000 titles of e-books to download with 35,000 are written in French, an offer that will grow every day.
Among them, contemporary authors like Michel Houellebecq, Katherine Pancol, Harlan Coben, Douglas Kennedy, hundreds of comics, books of youth practices and many more. For the contents of popular press such as Le Figaro, Libération, Les Echos, Le Parisien, Le Monde are also available by single purchase or subscription.
Amazon will also offer a "platform for self-publishing" digital destination for writers. The publishers would be offered upto 70% royalty on sales.
In the United States, where 12% of Americans have kindle readers, the demand of paperless paper increasing very fast and number sell stronger than books.
In France, despite an offer of kindle reader, which has grown, the digital book weighs only 1% of the publishing market say MEPs, who in May established a single price for the digital book. The arrival of a giant like Amazon could give a boost to the sector.
Several players have already lined up for battle, such as electronics giants Sony and Samsung, as well as bookstore chains present on this market last year with support dedicated to their content: Oyo (149 euros) for France Leisure and Fnacbook (179 euros) for Fnac, the leading book sales in France.
FNAC, which has already suffered from the dematerialization of music and the owner PPR for sale, did not disclose sales of its kindle reader, disappointing as the specialized press.
In September, CEO Alexandre Bompard said that the sign had in his drawer a "new kindle reader in development.
Unlike the current Fnacbook, which offers a 3G card to download on its site, Amazon has chosen to offer with "an aggressive price."
Sales of the Kindle remain secret, but they are measured in "millions", says Garambois.