Ebook Tech

For years, people have been forecasting the death of the e-reader. Ever since more flashy, multi-function tablets became mainstream – prompted by the launch of Apple’s iPad in 2010 – black-and-white e-readers with their matt e-ink screens have come to be seen as poor relations.
Indeed, earlier this year, Sony was forced to admit defeat in the e-reader market, withdrawing its Librie series of devices from stores in the US, then from Europe and Australia, and finally its home turf, Japan. The company said at the time that the product line was “no longer economically viable”.

However, the e-books industry is a lucrative one. The publishing industry as a whole is valued at about $100 billion, and e-books acount for about $14.5 billion of that, with the number expected to reach over $22 billion by 2017.
While many of these e-books are read via apps on smartphones and tablets, there remains a core group of passionate book lovers which contines to champion e-readers, claiming that e-ink screens are easier to read in sunlight and are less likely to cause eye-strain than the LCD displays commonly used in tablets.
When Japanese e-reader maker Kobo launched its Aura HD in July 2013, for example, the company’s expectations for the device were fairly modest – it predicted that the Aura HD would account for around 5 per cent of its sales. To everyone’s surprise, it ended up accounting for closer to 25 per cent.