It will be difficult to decouple hardware from marketplace, as it's already an increasingly specialized market for dedicated e-ink devices.
An e-ink device reads books
really well, and that's about it. Some can also read Pocket articles. Larger ones might be able to read PDFs or black-and-white comics comfortably, and a subset of those have stylus support, but that's about it.
Meanwhile your average ios/Android tablet can:
- read books
- read color comics
- watch videos
- access specialized apps to read certain things (i.e. Libby, Wikipedia, etc)
- browse the internet
So for your average consumer, if they've already got a tablet, the only compelling reasons they have to switch to a dedicated e-ink reader would be:
- They want a reading device larger than their phone but more portable than the average 8-10" tablet
- They want to read late at night without the tablet backlight keeping them awake
Given how much of the market Amazon and Apple already command, I just don't see a new player emerging onto the scene anytime soon. They're pretty much dead on arrival if they don't already have a load of publishers on board, or can piggyback onto an existing store (Google Play Books, maybe?).