Publishers Lunch
As we had heard a while ago, in conjunction
with their quarterly earnings release Sony confirmed that they are turning over
the North American Reader market to Kobo. "Sony's Reader Store customers
and their current ebook libraries will transfer to the Kobo ecosystem starting
in late March," they say in their announcement.
Kobo will service Sony Reader device owners and will be the ebook provider for
Sony's continuing lines of tablets and smartphones in the US and Canada. The
Kobo app will be pre-loaded onto "select" Sony phones and tablets.
Sony effectively abandoned further
development of the US market last September, when they confirmed that
their latest version of the dedicated Reader would not be sold in the US. At
the time they called it a "response to the region's market changes"
and said they would "be focusing instead on mobile and tablet
devices."
Sony will close their Reader Store "in
late March" and customers will get an email "from Sony with
instructions on how to easily transfer their library to a Kobo account."
In the release, vp of the Digital Reading
Business Division Ken Orii says, "Kobo is the ideal solution for our
customers and will deliver a robust and comprehensive user experience.... Our
customers can be assured that they will have a seamless transition to the Kobo
ecosystem and will be able to continue to access and read the titles they love
from Sony devices."
Outside of publishing the modest
announcement is overshadowed by far larger restructuring moves announced today
at Sony, which is spinning off its television business into a separate entity,
selling its unprofitable Vaio PC division, and cutting 5,000 jobs.
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