Amazon's UK Launch Of Kindle Delayed
This story was written by Dianne See Morrison.
Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN) won't be releasing its Kindle e-book device in the UK in time for Christmas, thanks to the complex agreements that it must secure with European operators to ensure the gadget works. In the US, Kindle uses whispernet, the Amazon data MVNO that uses the Sprint (NYSE: S) EVDO network to allow users to wirelessly download content. As Amazon UK MD Brian McBride told The Bookseller: "If you need agreement with carriers in the US, there is one carrier. In Europe it is a minefield as there are so many operators. If you buy a Kindle in the UK and want to read it on the beach on holiday in Spain, unless we have signed deals in Spain it is not going to work on that beach." McBride said he expected the device to hit the UK next year.
Book industry executives may be reading the news with a little sigh of relief. An informal survey conducted by the organizers of Frankfurt Book Fair, the largest gathering of its kind, found that the "spectre of the digital future" has many of them worried about their fate, reports Deutche Press Agentur (via monstersandcritics.com).
By Dianne See Morrison