Introducing the All-New Kindle Family: Four New Kindles, Four Amazing Price Points

New latest generation Kindle – world’s bestselling e-reader now lighter, faster, and more affordable than ever – only $79
New “Kindle Touch” with easy-to-use touch screen – only $99
New “Kindle Touch 3G” with free 3G – the top of the line Kindle e-reader – only $149
New “Kindle Fire” – the Kindle for movies, TV shows, music, books, magazines, apps, games, and web browsing with all the content, free storage in the Amazon Cloud, Whispersync, Amazon’s new revolutionary cloud-accelerated web browser, vibrant color touch screen, and powerful dual-core processor – all for only $199
SEATTLE, Sep 28, 2011 (BUSINESS WIRE) –

(NASDAQ: AMZN)–Millions of people are already reading on Kindles and Kindle is the bestselling e-reader in the world for four years running. Today, Amazon is excited to introduce an all-new Kindle family: three all-new Kindle e-readers that are smaller, lighter, and more affordable than ever before, and Kindle Fire – a new class of Kindle that brings the same ease-of-use and deep integration of content that helped Kindle re-invent reading – to movies, TV shows, music, magazines, apps, books, games, and more.

“We’ve now reached the magical two-digit price point for Kindle – twice: the new Kindle and Kindle Touch are only $79 and $99. Kindle Touch 3G is the new top of the line e-reader with free 3G – no monthly fees or annual contracts – and is only $149,” said Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com Founder and CEO. “Kindle Fire brings together all of the things we’ve been working on at Amazon for over 15 years into a single, fully-integrated service for customers. With Kindle Fire, you have instant access to all the content, free storage in the Amazon Cloud, the convenience of Amazon Whispersync, our revolutionary cloud-accelerated web browser, the speed and power of a state-of-the-art dual-core processor, a vibrant touch display with 16 million colors in high resolution, and a light 14.6 ounce design that’s easy to hold with one hand – all for only $199. We’re offering premium products, and we’re doing it at non-premium prices.”

New Latest Generation Kindle–Fits In Your Pocket–Only $79

The new latest generation Kindle is for readers who want the lightest, most compact Kindle at an incredible price. The latest generation Kindle features a new design that is 30 percent lighter at just 5.98 ounces, 18 percent smaller, and turns pages 10 percent faster. Kindle is now small and light enough to fit easily in your pocket and carry with you everywhere, yet it still features the same 6-inch, most advanced electronic ink display that reads like real paper, even in bright sunlight.

The new latest generation Kindle is only $79. Kindle is available starting today at www.amazon.com/kindle.

New Addition to the Kindle Family–”Kindle Touch”–Only $99

Kindle Touch is a new addition to the Kindle family with an easy-to-use touch screen that makes it easier than ever to turn pages, search, shop, and take notes – still with all the benefits of the most advanced electronic ink display. Kindle Touch is also lighter, smaller, eliminates battery anxiety with extra-long battery life and holds thousands of books.

New “X-Ray” Feature

Amazon invented X-Ray, a new feature that lets customers explore the “bones of the book.” With a single tap, readers can see all the passages across a book that mention ideas, fictional characters, historical figures, places or topics that interest them, as well as more detailed descriptions from Wikipedia and Shelfari, Amazon’s community-powered encyclopedia for book lovers. Amazon built X-Ray using its expertise in language processing and machine learning, access to significant storage and computing resources with Amazon S3 and EC2, and a deep library of book and character information. The vision is to have every important phrase in every book.

The new Kindle Touch is only $99. Kindle Touch is available to customers in the U.S. for pre-order starting today at www.amazon.com/kindletouch and ships November 21.

New Top of the Line Kindle e-reader–”Kindle Touch 3G” –Only $149

Kindle Touch 3G is a new addition to the Kindle family for readers who want the top of the line e-reader. Kindle Touch 3G offers the same new design and features of Kindle Touch – small and light, easy-to-use touch screen, storage for thousands of books, and extra-long battery life – with the unparalleled added convenience of free 3G. Kindle’s free 3G connection means you never have to hunt for or pay for a Wi-Fi hotspot – you simply download and read books anytime, anywhere in over 100 countries around the world. Amazon pays for the 3G connection so there’s no monthly fee or annual contract.

The new top of the line Kindle Touch 3G is only $149. Kindle Touch 3G is available to customers in the U.S. for pre-order starting today at www.amazon.com/kindletouch3G and ships November 21.

All Kindles have instant access to the Kindle Store with the largest selection of the most popular books people want to read. Millions of free, out-of-copyright, pre-1923 books are also available to read on Kindle devices, and Kindle customers can now borrow Kindle books from their public library. Kindle books are “Buy Once, Read Everywhere” – on Kindle, Kindle Touch, Kindle Touch 3G, Kindle Fire, iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, PCs, Mac, Android phones and tablets, BlackBerry, Windows phones, and web browsers with Kindle Cloud Reader.

All three new Kindle e-readers also come with special offers and sponsored screensavers that appear when you’re not reading. Customers enjoy special money-saving offers delivered wirelessly sponsored by AT&T, the Dove beauty brand and Amazon.com Rewards Visa Card by Chase. Kindle e-reader customers will also receive special offers in their own backyards from AmazonLocal, Amazon’s local deals marketplace with discounts on local services, products, and experiences. Customers can also choose to purchase a Kindle without special offers and sponsored screensavers.

New Class of Kindle–”Kindle Fire”–Only $199

All The Content–Over 18 Million Movies, TV Shows, Songs, Apps, Games, Books, and Magazines

Kindle Fire puts Amazon’s incredible selection of digital content at your fingertips:

 

• Over 100,000 movies and TV shows from Amazon Instant Video, including thousands of new releases and popular TV shows, available to stream or download, purchase or rent – all just one tap away. Amazon Prime Members enjoy instant, unlimited, commercial-free streaming of over 11,000 movies and TV shows at no additional cost. Kindle Fire comes with one free month of Amazon Prime.
• Over 17,000,000 songs from Amazon MP3, including new and bestselling albums from just $7.99 and individual songs from $0.69.
• Over 1,000,000 Kindle books, including thousands of bestsellers, children’s books, comic books and cookbooks in rich color.
• 100 exclusive graphic novels, including Watchmen, the bestselling – and considered by many to be the greatest – graphic novel of all time, which has never before been available in digital format, as well as Batman: Arkham City, Superman: Earth OneGreen Lantern: Secret Origin and 96 others from DC Entertainment.
• Hundreds of magazines and newspapers – including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, USA Today, Wired, Elle, The New Yorker, Cosmopolitan and Martha Stewart Living – with full-color layouts, photographs, illustrations, built-in video, audio and other interactive features are available from the new Kindle Fire “Newsstand.” Kindle Fire customers will enjoy an exclusive free three-month trial to 17 Condé Nast magazines, including Vanity Fair, GQ and Glamour.
• All the most popular Android apps and games, such as Angry Birds, Plants vs. Zombies, Cut the Rope and more. All apps are Amazon-tested on Kindle Fire to ensure quality and Amazon offers a new free paid app every day.

Cloud-Accelerated Web Browser – “Amazon Silk”

The Kindle Fire web browser Amazon Silk introduces a radical new paradigm – a “split browser” architecture that accelerates the power of the mobile device hardware by using the computing speed and power of the Amazon Web Services Cloud. The Silk browser software resides both on Kindle Fire and on the massive server fleet that comprises the Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2). With each page request, Silk dynamically determines a division of labor between the mobile hardware and Amazon EC2 (i.e. which browser sub-components run where) that takes into consideration factors like network conditions, page complexity, and cached content. The result is a faster web browsing experience, and it’s available exclusively on Kindle Fire. Additional technical details are available in the Amazon Silk press release, released today at www.amazon.com/pr. To see a video about Amazon Silk go to www.amazon.com/silk.

Simple and Easy-To-Use

Amazon designed the Kindle Fire user interface from the ground up to make it easier than ever to purchase, manage, and enjoy your digital content. Just like with Kindle e-readers, Kindle Fire comes automatically pre-registered to your Amazon.com account so you can immediately start enjoying your digital content purchased from Amazon or shop for new content. All of your digital content is instantly available to enjoy and manage with a simple, consistent experience across all content types.

Free Cloud Storage

Just like Kindle e-readers, Kindle Fire offers free storage for all your Amazon digital content in the Amazon Cloud. Amazon digital content is automatically backed up for free in the Amazon Cloud’s Worry-Free Archive where it’s available for re-downloading anytime.

Amazon Whispersync Now for Movies & TV Too

Just like Kindle e-readers, Kindle Fire uses Amazon’s popular Whispersync technology to automatically synchronize your Kindle library, last page read, bookmarks, notes, and highlights across the widest range of devices and platforms. With the introduction of Kindle Fire, Amazon is expanding this technology to include video. Start streaming a movie on your Kindle Fire, and when you get home, you can resume streaming right where you left off on your TV – avoid the frustration of needing to find your spot.

Easy to Hold in One Hand

Just like Kindle e-readers, Kindle Fire was designed to disappear so you can lose yourself in the content. Weighing in at just 14.6 ounces, Kindle Fire is small and light enough to hold in just one hand and carry everywhere you go. The lightweight, compact design makes Kindle Fire perfect for web browsing, playing games, reading and shopping on-the-go.

Brilliant Color Touchscreen

Content comes alive in rich color on a 7-inch full color LCD touchscreen that delivers 16 million colors in high resolution and 169 pixels per inch. Kindle Fire uses IPS (in-plane switching) technology – similar technology as used on the iPad, for an extra-wide viewing angle – perfect for sharing your screen with others. In addition, the Kindle Fire display is chemically strengthened to be 20 times stiffer and 30 times harder than plastic, which means it is incredibly durable and will stand up to accidental bumps and scrapes.

Fast, Powerful Dual-Core Processor

Kindle Fire features a state-of-the-art dual-core processor for fast, powerful performance. Stream music while browsing the web or read books while downloading videos.

Free Month of Amazon Prime

Right out of the box, Kindle Fire users will experience the benefits that millions of Amazon Prime members already enjoy - unlimited, commercial-free, instant streaming of over 11,000 movies and TV shows with Prime Instant Video and the convenience of Free Two-Day Shipping on millions of items from Amazon.com.

Only $199

The all-new Kindle Fire – with all the content, Amazon’s revolutionary cloud-accelerated browser, free storage in the Amazon Cloud, Whispersync, 14.6 ounce design that’s easy to hold with one hand, brilliant color touchscreen, and a fast and powerful dual core processor – is only $199. Customers in the U.S. can pre-order Kindle Fire starting today at www.amazon.com/kindlefire and it ships November 15.

For high resolution images and video of the all-new Kindle family, visit www.amazon.com/pr/kindle.

About Amazon.com

Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN), a Fortune 500 company based in Seattle, opened on the World Wide Web in July 1995 and today offers Earth’s Biggest Selection. Amazon.com, Inc. seeks to be Earth’s most customer-centric company, where customers can find and discover anything they might want to buy online, and endeavors to offer its customers the lowest possible prices. Amazon.com and other sellers offer millions of unique new, refurbished and used items in categories such as Books; Movies, Music & Games; Digital Downloads; Electronics & Computers; Home & Garden; Toys, Kids & Baby; Grocery; Apparel, Shoes & Jewelry; Health & Beauty; Sports & Outdoors; and Tools, Auto & Industrial. Amazon Web Services provides Amazon’s developer customers with access to in-the-cloud infrastructure services based on Amazon’s own back-end technology platform, which developers can use to enable virtually any type of business. The new latest generation Kindle is the lightest, most compact Kindle ever and features the same 6-inch, most advanced electronic ink display that reads like real paper even in bright sunlight. Kindle Touch is a new addition to the Kindle family with an easy-to-use touch screen that makes it easier than ever to turn pages, search, shop, and take notes – still with all the benefits of the most advanced electronic ink display. Kindle Touch 3G is the top of the line e-reader and offers the same new design and features of Kindle Touch, with the unparalleled added convenience of free 3G. Kindle Fire is the Kindle for movies, TV shows, music, books, magazines, apps, games and web browsing with all the content, free storage in the Amazon Cloud, Whispersync, Amazon Silk (Amazon’s new revolutionary cloud-accelerated web browser), vibrant color touch screen, and powerful dual-core processor.

Amazon and its affiliates operate websites, including www.amazon.com, www.amazon.co.uk, www.amazon.de, www.amazon.co.jp, www.amazon.fr, www.amazon.ca, www.amazon.cn, www.amazon.it, and www.amazon.es. As used herein, “Amazon.com,” “we,” “our” and similar terms include Amazon.com, Inc., and its subsidiaries, unless the context indicates otherwise.

Forward-Looking Statements

This announcement contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Actual results may differ significantly from management’s expectations. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that include, among others, risks related to competition, management of growth, new products, services and technologies, potential fluctuations in operating results, international expansion, outcomes of legal proceedings and claims, fulfillment center optimization, seasonality, commercial agreements, acquisitions and strategic transactions, foreign exchange rates, system interruption, inventory, government regulation and taxation, payments and fraud. More information about factors that potentially could affect Amazon.com’s financial results is included in Amazon.com’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and subsequent filings.

Amazon announced on Thursday that Amazon.com customers are now purchasing more books for the Kindle than print books — including hardcover and paperback — combined. Since April 1st, for example, for every 100 print books that were sold on Amazon.com, the site sold 105 Kindle eBooks. “Customers are now choosing Kindle books more often than print books,” Amazon’s CEO and Founder Jeff Bezos said. “We had high hopes that this would happen eventually, but we never imagined it would happy this quickly — we’ve been selling print books for 15 years and Kindle books for less than four years.” Bezos also noted that Amazon has been pleased with the customer response to the $114 Kindle with Special Offers product, which is the most popular selling Kindle right now. Hit the jump for the full release.

Amazon.com Now Selling More Kindle Books Than Print Books

Kindle with Special Offers for only $114 is already the bestselling member of the Kindle family

SEATTLE, May 19, 2011 (BUSINESS WIRE) –

(NASDAQ:AMZN)–Amazon began selling hardcover and paperback books in July 1995. Twelve years later in November 2007, Amazon introduced the revolutionary Kindle and began selling Kindle books. By July 2010, Kindle book sales had surpassed hardcover book sales, and six months later, Kindle books overtook paperback books to become the most popular format on Amazon.com. Today, less than four years after introducing Kindle books, Amazon.com customers are now purchasing more Kindle books than all print books – hardcover and paperback – combined.

“Customers are now choosing Kindle books more often than print books. We had high hopes that this would happen eventually, but we never imagined it would happen this quickly – we’ve been selling print books for 15 years and Kindle books for less than four years,” said Jeff Bezos, Founder and CEO, Amazon.com. “In addition, we’re excited by the response to Kindle with Special Offers for only $114, which has quickly become the bestselling member of the Kindle family. We continue to receive positive comments from customers on the low $114 price and the money-saving special offers. We’re grateful to our customers for continuing to make Kindle the bestselling e-reader in the world and the Kindle Store the most popular e-bookstore in the world.”

Recent milestones for Kindle include:

• Since April 1, for every 100 print books Amazon.com has sold, it has sold 105 Kindle books. This includes sales of hardcover and paperback books by Amazon where there is no Kindle edition. Free Kindle books are excluded and if included would make the number even higher.
• So far in 2011, the tremendous growth of Kindle book sales, combined with the continued growth in Amazon’s print book sales, have resulted in the fastest year-over-year growth rate for Amazon’s U.S. books business, in both units and dollars, in over 10 years. This includes books in all formats, print and digital. Free books are excluded in the calculation of growth rates.
• In the five weeks since its introduction, Kindle with Special Offers for only $114 is already the bestselling member of the Kindle family in the U.S.
• Amazon sold more than 3x as many Kindle books so far in 2011 as it did during the same period in 2010.
• Less than one year after introducing the UK Kindle Store, Amazon.co.uk is now selling more Kindle books than hardcover books, even as hardcover sales continue to grow. Since April 1, Amazon.co.uk customers are purchasing Kindle books over hardcover books at a rate of more than 2 to 1.

Kindle offers the largest selection of the most popular books people want to read. The U.S. Kindle Store now has more than 950,000 books, including New Releases and 109 of 111 New York Times Best Sellers. Over 790,000 of these books are $9.99 or less, including 69 New York Times Best Sellers. Millions of free, out-of-copyright, pre-1923 books are also available to read on Kindle devices. More than 175,000 books have been added to the Kindle Store in just the last 5 months.

All Kindle Books let you “Buy Once, Read Everywhere” – on all generation Kindles, as well as on the largest number of devices and platforms, including iPad, iPod touch, iPhone, Mac, PC, BlackBerry, Windows Phone, Android-based devices, and soon HP TouchPads and BlackBerry PlayBooks. Amazon’s Whispersync technology syncs your place across devices, so you can pick up where you left off. With Kindle Worry-Free Archive, books you purchase from the Kindle Store are automatically backed up online in your Kindle library on Amazon, where they can be re-downloaded wirelessly for free, anytime.

Android is planning to release an “entire family” of Android-powered devices, not just one tablet as originally thought, according to Android and Me. The rumor hasn’t specified whether or not Amazon is planning multiple sized tablets, or a tablet and a new Android-powered eReader, although there’s some speculation that a smartphone could be in the works too. It’s no secret that the company is working on at least one tablet. Earlier this week Amazon’s CEO, Jeff Bezos, said “stay tuned” for more information on the product, which is rumored to have been manufactured by Samsung and could launch as early as this summer. However, Android and Me disputes those claims and believes the devices will land closer to the holiday season. Either way, it certainly makes sense for at least one Amazon tablet to exist: the firm has already launched its Unbox movie and TV streaming service, Amazon’s Cloud Player and Cloud Drive for music and data storage, and Kindle for books, all of which fit perfectly on a tablet.

Read

What’s this, you say? News of a major retailer doing better than expected despite the tough economic times? We know, we know. It’s hard to believe, but some folks are weathering the economy’s downturn better than the media would have you believe. According to Amazon’s Q4 report from 2008, the company did pretty well during the oh-so-important holiday sales season. Amazon posted a net sales increase of 18% to $6.7 billion, with net income shooting up 9% to $225 million. Not so bad, especially given the dire state of just about every other ledger report we’ve seen over the past couple weeks. Amazon shares shot up 12% following the release of the report. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos also gave a relatively positive estimate for Q1 2009, predicting between 9-19% increase in sales, though he does expect a significant decline in net operating income.All told, however, it’s nice to see some positive news coming out of the tech sector, and we can only hope that we’ll see some more similar progress to combat the prevailing fear and uncertainty.

Read