November was bestselling month ever for the Amazon’s reading device and December was a very good month sales for the Kindle, too.
Last January, Kindle was the #1 bestselling product on Amazon, again.
Congratulations!

U.S. Internet retailer Amazon.com Inc said on Thursday that its Kindle sales have already broke a monthly sales record, barely halfway through the month of December.
Amazon says the Kindle was the most wished, the most gifted and the #1 bestselling product across across the retailer’s site.
Amazon also announced yesterday it would sell Kindle (Global Wireless) with free expedited shipping — a contrast with its competitor Barnes & Noble, which has suffered delays in getting its Nook electronic reader into customers’ hands.

“The Kindle has definitely established itself as the iPod of the book world,” a Citigroup analyst told investors Thursday.

The Kindle, an e-book reader drawing the most attention beside Apple’s rumored tablet, could earn Amazon $1.6 billion in 2010, according to analyst Mark Mahoney. The analyst said the Kindle is having “greater than expected traction” and expects the company to sell 2 million Kindles in 2009 – up from 1.5 million previously forecast.

In November, Amazon announced record sales for the Kindle, saying the e-reader was “flying off the shelves faster than any other product Amazon sells.” The Internet retailer did not release any sales figures, however.

Source: Cult of Mac.

November was the best sales month ever for the Kindle e-reader, even before traditionally heavy sales on Cyber Monday, Amazon.com said early today.

“Kindle is a great gift for anyone who loves to read and it’s flying off the shelves faster than any other product Amazon sells,” said Ian Freed, vice president of Amazon’s Kindle division.

The latest Kindle generation, released in October, sells for $259 and is available for immediate shipment, Amazon.com said.

The fact that the Kindle device is shipping immediately may be Amazon.com’s main reason for making today’s announcement, drawing attention to Kindles remaining in stock compared to e-readers from other device makers that are sold out.

For example, the $259 Nook from Barnes & Noble Inc., was due to hit bookstores today after several weeks of pre-sales, but was recently reported out of stock, with deliveries starting after Jan. 4. Sony also said on Nov. 18 that its Daily Edition e-reader might not make it to buyers before the end of the year.

Source: Computerworld.

The eReader market is growing faster than expected: Forrester published a report in May, “How Big Is The eReader Opportunity?”, that pegged 2009 US eReader sales at 2 million. Our new report ups that projection by 50% to 3 million for 2009, with 30% of 2009 sales occuring in the holiday season of November and December, and Amazon.com leading the ereader market.

There are a number of reasons why eReader sales are growing faster than we had expected, which we detail in the report, including falling device prices, more content availability, better retail distribution, and lots and lots of media buzz.

All these dynamics will compound to fuel more growth next year, and we expect more changes in the market that could push eReader sales beyond 6 million in 2010, bringing cumulative US sales to 10 million by year-end 2010.

With Nook & Sony readers out of stock, we can say next will be a Kindle Christmas.

Source: Forrester.

Sales of electronic books jumped 68.4 percent last year and skyrocketed 177 percent to $96.6 million for the year through August, according to the Association of American Publishers. That’s not counting the millions downloaded for free at public libraries, where e-books are fast becoming one of the most popular features. And Amazon has said that its e-book reader, the Kindle, has become the best-selling product on its Web site.

But despite the staggering growth, e-books remain just a sliver of the overall publishing industry, at 1.5 percent of the $6.8 billion in sales this year — about on par with audiobooks. And some experts believe that the $200-plus price tag for e-book readers will keep the market from exploding the way MP3s did.

Holiday hopes

This holiday season will be a crucial test of whether e-books can cross over from geeky novelty to mass-market must-have. Major retailers are pushing the format — and, of course, the gadgets they’ve developed to display it. Barnes & Noble unveiled its first electronic book reader last month, with access to all of the retailer’s titles and then some. Amazon and Sony, which make the two best-selling e-readers in the country, have introduced new versions just in time to stuff your stocking. And this holiday, for the first time, Best Buy is devoting store space to educating shoppers about e-readers.

All told, about 1.2 million e-readers are expected to be sold in the last three months of the year — roughly 40 percent of the entire year’s stock. By the end of 2010, industry experts predict, 10 million people will be carrying e-readers. As for the number of e-books that people have read, they’ve lost track.

If you want a Kindle or want to gift a Kindle this Christmas, maybe you’d better get one now before the Kindle went out of stock.

Read more: The Washington Post.

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos with Kindle DX
© AFP/Emmanuel Dunand

Amazon crowned a new bestseller on Thursday — the Kindle, its electronic book reader.

“Kindle has become the number one bestselling item by both unit sales and dollars — not just in our electronics store but across all product categories on Amazon.com,” said Amazon founder and chief executive Jeff Bezos.

In keeping with previous practice, Bezos declined to reveal sales figures for the Kindle, but Forrester Research estimates the device has a nearly 60 percent share of the US market followed by the Sony Reader with 35 percent.

Forrester estimates that three million e-readers will be sold in the United States this year, up from a previous forecast of two million units, and for e-reader sales to double to six million units next year.

Bezos also announced that the price of the newest international version of the Kindle, which is designed to synch with telecom networks in 100 countries, was being cut to 259 dollars from 279 dollars.

The Bezos statements came as his Seattle-based company reported a 68 percent rise in net profit in the third quarter to 199 million dollars, or 45 cents per share, better than the 33 cents per share forecast by Wall Street analysts.

Revenue increased 28 percent to 5.45 billion dollars during the quarter which ended on September 30.

Amazon shares soared 14.77 percent in after-hours electronic trading to a record 107.25 dollars.

Unlike eBay, which unveiled a cautious outlook for the holiday season the previous day, Amazon delivered an optimistic sales forecast for the Christmas period.

It said it expected fourth-quarter sales of between 8.1 billion dollars and 9.1 billion dollars, an increase of between 21 percent and 36 percent over last year.

Amazon said North America sales rose 23 percent in the quarter to 2.84 billion dollars while international sales from its British, German, Japanese, French and Chinese sites rose 33 percent to 2.61 billion dollars.

It said worldwide media sales, which include music, books and other items, grew 17 percent to 2.93 billion dollars.

Sales of electronics and other general merchandise sales climbed 44 percent to 2.36 billion dollars.

Amazon also said that the Kindle book store has increased its number of titles to more than 360,000 books including 101 of the 112 New York Times bestsellers.

Bezos told Amazon’s annual shareholders meeting in May that the company may never reveal Kindle sales figures. “Our point of view on that is that there can often be a competitive advantage in keeping the numbers close,” he said.

But Amazon is not the only firm trying to shake up the market for electronic books.

Google is pressing ahead with plans to digitize thousands of books and on Wednesday hardware firm Hewlett-Packard said it would get in on the action, stepping up its out-of-print book publishing business and taking on Google.

The US computer giant announced Wednesday it has teamed with the University of Michigan to offer print versions of more than 500,000 out-of-copyright books in the school’s library.

Source: AFP American Edition

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos with Kindle DX
© AFP/Emmanuel Dunand

Amazon crowned a new bestseller on Thursday — the Kindle, its electronic book reader.

“Kindle has become the number one bestselling item by both unit sales and dollars — not just in our electronics store but across all product categories on Amazon.com,” said Amazon founder and chief executive Jeff Bezos.

In keeping with previous practice, Bezos declined to reveal sales figures for the Kindle, but Forrester Research estimates the device has a nearly 60 percent share of the US market followed by the Sony Reader with 35 percent.

Forrester estimates that three million e-readers will be sold in the United States this year, up from a previous forecast of two million units, and for e-reader sales to double to six million units next year.

Bezos also announced that the price of the newest international version of the Kindle, which is designed to synch with telecom networks in 100 countries, was being cut to 259 dollars from 279 dollars.

The Bezos statements came as his Seattle-based company reported a 68 percent rise in net profit in the third quarter to 199 million dollars, or 45 cents per share, better than the 33 cents per share forecast by Wall Street analysts.

Revenue increased 28 percent to 5.45 billion dollars during the quarter which ended on September 30.

Amazon shares soared 14.77 percent in after-hours electronic trading to a record 107.25 dollars.

Unlike eBay, which unveiled a cautious outlook for the holiday season the previous day, Amazon delivered an optimistic sales forecast for the Christmas period.

It said it expected fourth-quarter sales of between 8.1 billion dollars and 9.1 billion dollars, an increase of between 21 percent and 36 percent over last year.

Amazon said North America sales rose 23 percent in the quarter to 2.84 billion dollars while international sales from its British, German, Japanese, French and Chinese sites rose 33 percent to 2.61 billion dollars.

It said worldwide media sales, which include music, books and other items, grew 17 percent to 2.93 billion dollars.

Sales of electronics and other general merchandise sales climbed 44 percent to 2.36 billion dollars.

Amazon also said that the Kindle book store has increased its number of titles to more than 360,000 books including 101 of the 112 New York Times bestsellers.

Bezos told Amazon’s annual shareholders meeting in May that the company may never reveal Kindle sales figures. “Our point of view on that is that there can often be a competitive advantage in keeping the numbers close,” he said.

But Amazon is not the only firm trying to shake up the market for electronic books.

Google is pressing ahead with plans to digitize thousands of books and on Wednesday hardware firm Hewlett-Packard said it would get in on the action, stepping up its out-of-print book publishing business and taking on Google.

The US computer giant announced Wednesday it has teamed with the University of Michigan to offer print versions of more than 500,000 out-of-copyright books in the school’s library.

Source: AFP American Edition