October 15, 2010
Amazon Kindle biz boosted by… Apple iPad
Register Hardware
Tony Smith writes how the Apple iPad is impacting Amazon Kindle sales.
“The iPad contribution comes from the iOS apps Amazon has released. Cowen spoke to 500 iPad owners and found that a third of them prefer to read e-books using Amazon’s app. They said the online retailer provides a better selection titles than Apple’s own e-book store and app, iBooks. Kindle prices tend to be lower too. Crucially, the survey results suggest that it’s those user who buy more books – 25 or more a year – who are more likely to favour the Kindle app.”
Tablets? Pah! Netbooks still selling well, says analyst…
Register Hardware
Tony Smith shares some insight from ABI Research regarding the future of the netbook.
“Rumours of the death of netbook are greatly exaggerated, it has been claimed by one market watcher after it calculates that netbooks will have outsold the iPad and other such tablets almost 4:1 by the end of 2010. Some 43m netbooks will have been shipped by the time the year is up, but only 11m tablets, ABI Research said today. That’s still good growth for the netbook, it said, even if not as meteoric a rise as the category has experienced in the past. ABI didn’t say today how many netbooks shipped in 2009, but earlier this year it put the total at 36.3m. That’s year-on-year growth of just under 19 per cent.”
Seagate: Why it makes sense to go private now
ZD Net
Larry Dignan writes that Seagate is considering going private again.
“Seagate is pondering to move to go private again and the timing makes a lot of sense given the hard drive market could face a wrenching change amid the popularity of tablets. In a short statement, Seagate confirmed reports that it may go private. The company said “it has received a preliminary indication of interest regarding a going private transaction.” Bloomberg reported that TPG and KKR were the parties interested in buying out Seagate. In 2000, Seagate went private right before the tech bust in a complicated deal valued at $20 billion. Going private allowed Seagate to ride out the storm out of public view.”
