Amazon to sell Kindle ebooks via iPhone

Online retail giant Amazon.com will introduce a free Kindle ebook application for Apple's iPhone and iPod touch, offering consumers full access to more than 240,000 premium digital titles. The move follows a week after Amazon.com began shipping the second edition of its $359 Kindle ereader device, although the company contends mobile phones will complement the Kindle model, offering users the opportunity to read books in abbreviated, snack-size periods. "We think the iPhone can be a great companion device for customers who are caught without their Kindle," Ian Freed, Amazon's vice president in charge of the Kindle, tells the New York Times, adding consumers will still favor the Kindle for extended reading sessions due to the device's long battery life and text-friendly screen.

On the eve of the Kindle 2's release, Amazon.com first indicated its plans to extend its digital services to the mobile ecosystem, telling the New York Times it aims to distribute ebooks across various handsets and platforms. "We are excited to make Kindle books available on a range of mobile phones," Amazon spokesman Drew Herdener said. "We are working on that now." In addition, Amazon recently said its Whispersync synchronization service would enable users to access their library of Kindle titles across multiple devices at no additional cost, even offering automatic bookmarks so users may stop reading a book on one device and continue at the same point on another.

While many analysts previously speculated the Kindle was Amazon's attempt to follow in the footsteps of Apple's iPod, the etailer's move into the App Store signals its ebook business is more about selling content across multiple device platforms. Last month, Citigroup analyst Mark Mahaney crunched the numbers on the first wave of Kindle sales and estimated Amazon sold 500,000 units last year based on a filing by Sprint (which operates the Amazon Whispernet wireless delivery system enabling mobile shopping and over-the-air content downloading). Mahaney forecasts the device will become a $1.2 billion business by 2010, assuming Kindle adoption will increase at a pace similar to the growth experienced by the iPod and that consumers will purchase at least one ebook download per month.

For more on Amazon's iPhone:
- read this New York Times article

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