Chinese IT giant the Founder Group showed off its $200 Kindle-like e-reader for the Japanese and Chinese market this week at Tokyo’s Digital Publishing Fair for the first time.
Founder, which has already revolutionized China’s publishing industry with the introduction of a laser typesetting machine, told PW that the e-ink, Kindle-like device is a prototype developed with cooperation of professors from Beijing University and will be initially commercially launched at the end of the year in China.
"Although the new e-reader of the Founder Group could be mistaken for a replica of Amazon's Kindle, its looks were created to draw public attention and promote the new e-reader," said a company spokesperson denying that the end product would be a Amazon rip-off.
The Chinese e-reader, with a similar 6-inch, black and white e-ink screen, also differs from the Kindle 2 in two other important respects. By using a SIM card, contents can be directly downloaded to the terminal, while its cellular modem means wireless downloads will not, unlike the Kindle, be restricted to only one network.
The device is also configured to display double-byte characters — essential for reading scripts in Japanese, Chinese and Korean characters, suggesting to some experts that such a device could dominate the potentially huge market for e-readers in Asia outside of Japan.
"The DPF (digital publishing format) looks like a neat device with great potential, but it is unlikely to clean up in Japan where such well known makers as Sony are already exploring such devices, and doing so in Chinese as well as Japanese and English," said Asian media expert David Kilburn. "It will be tough market, with evolving technologies, newly emerging consumer preferences, and falling prices."
