Sony 10,3" Color E-Reader (DPT-CP1 Version 2)

[Pajamaman]

In 2019 comic an graphic novel sales in N.America were 1.2 billion. Only 90 million of that was via digital downloads. Saying that, I personally cannot read a comic on a tablet, and I'm sure many other readers feel the same way. So a color ereader will contribute to an increase in the digital comic download. But I don't think the digital comic market will be enough by itself for Amazon to release a color ereader.

If magazines with color pictures were sold, I think they would have to be converted to epub or whatever. That's a lot of work, and for how much return?

And then there are other book with color images, but I assume that's not that important a number, though it would be nice.

Nevertheless, the potential of color e-ink is overwhelming. It's coming, and it is dangerous for the big players to ignore it. But the actual tech is being tested by the small players, so the big players can jump on board when they feel like it.

Kobo has a longer resume of releasing new tech to the market. I would not be surprised to see a color Kobo in 12 months. But I'm not sure what books they would sell on it that would justify it to readers. That's an issue, at least in the short term. Maybe they don't need to sell that many color ereaders to break even.

[tomsem]

I would even question who will be buying the Sony device, which iterates on a 3 year old device that sells for about $600US. Presumably this will cost more than that. It doesn’t even seem to have expandable storage. 32GB is not that much if you need to carry around many PDFs (lawyers maybe?).

[Pajamaman]

Frankly I'm surprised Sony sell these devices, but not e-readers. It's so niche. Can they really make a worthwhile profit? Surely they made more from e-readers. I wonder if they are keeping their hand in the tech in case it takes off.

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

Frankly I'm surprised Sony sell these devices, but not e-readers. It's so niche. Can they really make a worthwhile profit? Surely they made more from e-readers.

How profitable is the hardware business, when you are competing with Amazon and Kobo who can subsidize the hardware through book sales?

[John F]

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

...

If magazines with color pictures were sold, I think they would have to be converted to epub or whatever. That's a lot of work, and for how much return?

...

Magazines are already available digitally, so I tend to think it wouldn't be a lot if work.

[rkomar]

These are not really consumer devices. They were aimed at professionals dealing with documentation, and tried to meet the more stringent privacy requirements that such professions have. For extra bucks, your business can get Sony's server-side software for managing the documents. People reading fiction epubs are not the target market, so no need to point out how they are going to fail selling them for that.

[tomsem]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

How profitable is the hardware business, when you are competing with Amazon and Kobo who can subsidize the hardware through book sales?

I doubt either of them lose money on hardware sales, but robust book sales make it much easier to hit that break even point. I’m guessing that Sony had a real problem generating book sales and that’s why they got out, never to return.