Quote:
Originally Posted by BadBilly
Kobo was a response to the Kindle involving several brick-and-mortar booksellers. As you may have noticed, that is a business that is in trouble. So, not only did they not have as much clout as Amazon in getting content from publishers and getting the discounts, they didn't have the huge cashflow that Amazon has. This cashflow allowed Amazon to not care about making money on the readers and not care too much about making money on the books.
Amazon made it very easy for people in the USA to get the books they purchase onto their devices, something Kobo could not do.
Now, outside the USA, the story is something different. Kobo has good market presence in Canada (a primary investor in the company was Canada's near-monopoly book retailer) and in other countries where large book sellers were partnered with it.
Kobo also has an advantage outside the USA because most public libraries in those countries only lend out ebooks in epub format. In Canada, for example, Kindles are for people who want to buy every book they read. Kobos (and my beloved Sony T1) are for people who want to borrow library books.
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A couple of minor nits. Kobo was not a response by several brick and mortar retailers--Kobo was Chapters/Indigo's creation as Shortcovers and was later spun off and still later purchased by Japan's Rakuten. As for the good market presence in Canada? Kobo was (and still is) headquartered in Toronto, Ontario. When I was looking at a replacement for my original ereader, the Kobo I choose was priced a lot cheaper than the Kindle equivalent though Amazon did drop their ereader prices very soon after the Kobo went on sale. In May, 2010, the Kobo cost me $149 Cdn vs. $259 US ($271.92 Cdn) I would have had to pay for a Kindle. If I'd waited till June, 2010, I could have purchased the Kindle for $189 US.