After more than a year of speculation and delays, Amazon Kindle e-readers and tablets will reportedly be available for sale in China on June 7. E-readers like the Paperwhite and Kindle Fire tablets will be sold on Amazon China’s Web site, as well as Tesco stores operated by retail conglomerate Suning. Amazon Kindle kiosks have already been spotted in a Beijing Tesco, Sina Tech reports (link via Google Translate).

The price of the Kindle Paperwhite Wi-Fi has reportedly been set at 849 RMB (about $138), while the Kindle Fire HD will sell for about 1,400 to 1,500 RMB ($228 to $244).

Amazon has gradually rolled out its Kindle platform in China. Documentation appeared late last year showing that the Kindle had begun to support simplified Chinese characters. In December, Amazon’s China site added a Kindle store category and made Kindle app downloads available.

The company also launched its Chinese-language Web site for developers earlier this month, promising that they would soon have access to customers in 200 countries.

Despite its slow and steady approach, Amazon has faced several obstacles, including regulatory challenges for its e-book business from the General Administration of Press and Publication, China’s state censorship organization. Amazon China does not have a license to publish e-books and instead partnered with domestic e-publisher ChineseAll.com to launch Kindle book downloads last December. In response, the General Administration of Press and Publication launched an investigation into the partnership last December, stating that borrowing a license is against the law.

It’s also unclear if Amazon will be able to reap any profit from tapping into the world’s second-largest market in the e-reader industry. In the U.S., Amazon sells its hardware at cost, relying instead on sales of books, apps and movies for profit. In China, however, Amazon not only has to deal with scrutiny, but also with domestic competitors, including media conglomerate Hanvon, Dangdang and Shanda, who have already gained a solid foothold on the e-publishing market, as well as pirated versions of popular titles. The wide availability of e-books, as well as cheap Android tablets, may mean Amazon will have to make significant adjustments to its revenue model in China.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Amazon today took one more step in its strategy scale up its Kindle Fire tablet business. The company announced that it will now sell the two higher-end versions of the device, the Kindle Fire HD and Kindle Fire HD 8.9″, globally: pre-orders in 170 countries begins today with the first models shipping out June 13.

Although the HD is available with an optional LTE component in the U.S. it looks like this rollout is WiFi-only: to improve range and service, it comes with dual-band Wi-Fi capability for both 2.4 GHz network and 5 GHz network services. As with other Kindle Fire products, the two models going on sale today will work with Amazon’s existing and wide range of content, including apps, films, TV, games and 300+ books “exclusive to the Kindle Store.”

The move comes two months after Amazon dropped the price on the bigger two tablets, with an 8.9″ screen, to $269. At that time, it started selling it in Europe and Japan. To date, Amazon has been selling the two HD tablets in the U.S., UK, Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Japan. For a company like Amazon, which operates on a basis of competition-beating prices and low margins, it’s important for it to add as much scale as it can to its operation, so expanding Fire HD sales globally is an essential part of that strategy.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Samsung introduced its latest tablet today, the Galaxy Tab 3, and it’s clear that the Tab line is destined to play a distinct second fiddle to the Galaxy Note brand. The Tab 3 sounds like it could’ve been released a year or two ago, with a 7-inch 1024

Flurry, an app analytics firm with a presence on some now 1 billion mobile devices, has taken another deep dive into its large data set to examine the increasingly fragmented selection of hardware form factors on the market today, in an effort to better understand consumer preferences. The report concludes that people most prefer and use apps on medium-sized smartphones, like those in the Samsung Galaxy line, and full-sized tablets like the iPad. “Phablets,” meanwhile, Flurry dubs a “fad,” saying that they don’t show significant, or even disproportionally significant, app usage.

To reach these conclusions, Flurry’s report looked at the top 200 device models in its database, which represent over 80 percent of all usage. It then broke down the devices into the following five groups:

1. Small phones (e.g., most Blackberries), 3.5” or under screens
2. Medium phones (e.g., iPhone), between 3.5” – 4.9” screens
3. Phablets (e.g., Galaxy Note), 5.0” – 6.9” screens
4. Small Tablets (e.g., Kindle Fire), 7.0” – 8.4” screens
5. Full-size tablets (e.g., the iPad), 8.5” or greater screens

You can see the distribution of these devices in the chart below – e.g., 16 percent have screen sizes 3.5 inches or smaller (in diagonal length); 69 percent are 3.5 to 4.9 inches – a large group which includes the iPhone; 6 percent are small tablets like the Kindle Fire and iPad mini; 7 percent are full-sized tablets like the iPad. Meanwhile, just 2 percent of devices are “phablets.”

But as you may already know, device distribution doesn’t always equate to how those platforms are actually being used by consumers. Android users, for example, despite the platform’s dominant global market share, show less engagement than iOS users overall, and watch less video.

So Flurry compared the device install base with the number of active users and app sessions. The conclusions support the trends we’ve been hearing about for some time. For instance, even though small-screened devices account for 16 percent of devices in the market, only 7 percent are “active devices,” once users per device are taken into account, and only represent 4 percent of overall app sessions.

For tablets, however, it’s the opposite – despite their small market share (7 percent of the top 200), they represent 15 percent of active users and 13 percent of active sessions.

Flurry says this is because on the small end, users are on older phones, like Blackberry models, so there are fewer active users per model. These small devices are also obviously not ideal for running and using apps. And tablets, of course, are.

However, on the in-between screen sizes known as “phablets,” their install base is 2 percent, while active users and sessions is just 3 percent. “Phablets are a fad,” proclaims Flurry in its post about this finding.

The OS-specific data is fairly obvious. Medium-sized phones are the dominant form factor across all operating systems except Blackberry, the report also notes. Android dominantes the “phablet” market, while iOS dominates large tablets. The only Windows Phone devices in the top 200 are medium-sized phones.

What is interesting is are the app trends across form factors. “Tablets are gaming machines,” says Flurry, noting that a third of time spent gaming now takes place on larger tablets like the iPad, as well as small tablets and phablets. “And while they command consumer time spent, they represented only 15% of device models in use in February and 21% of individual connected devices. These differences are statistically significant,” the post notes.

And oddly enough, despite the tablets’ larger screens, they don’t see a larger portion of time spent in the books and video categories. Flurry speculates that’s because consumers are consuming a lot of text and video on their smartphones already.

The report concludes that developers concentrate their efforts on medium-sized devices and tablets, not phablets and other small-screened phones.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

The Barnes & Noble Nook isn’t doing amazingly well by most accounts, including a recently introduced giveaway program from the company itself that isn’t quite (but sure resembles) a fire sale. Now, B&N has made an announcement that is clearly designed to prop up developer interest in the platform, with the introduction of a feature that brings it up-to-speed with others: in-app purchases.

In-app purchases aren’t coming to Nook right away; they’ll be rolling out gradually over the next few weeks and months, with availability beginning in April, thanks to a new partnership with mobile payments company Fortumo. Fortumo will be providing the software tools and resources needed to build in the in-app purchases, as well as a dashboard where developers can track their progress.

It’s about time, too. In-app purchases have been available on iOS and Android for years now, and in fact have risen to become one of the most important revenue sources for developers on those platforms. Amazon, the Nook’s chief direct rival, took the beta label off of its own in-app purchase system back in April 2012. That brought Kindle Fire and Fire HD developers the chance to implement the popular revenue generating option, so the Nook HD, HD+, Nook Color and Nook Tablet are now a year behind their biggest competition.

Nook’s implementation through Fortumo will be one-click, the company says in its official release. ”In-app purchasing makes it possible for developers to ensure the customer only pays when they absolutely love the app,” said Rain Rannu, Co-Founder and CEO of Fortumo in the announcement. “This has proven to be a compelling value proposition for customers and a very successful strategy for developers.”

Nook needs this to be a draw for both developers and consumers, which is why it’s promoting the feature now before it’s fully baked. Nook sales dropped significantly last quarter, contributing to a $6.1 million quarterly loss. Digital content sales were up, however, and Barnes & Noble said that it remained fully committed to Nook hardware. In-app purchases are a good way to both capitalize on and hopefully increase digital goods sales, while making Nook hardware more attractive to consumers who are now used to the freemium model of content delivery. But it’s a late move, and one that brings the Nook only to parity with other, more popular platforms.

A key ingredient will be the revenue agreement B&N works out with developers for in-app purchases. It hasn’t shared that info on its site or in the announcement, but we’ve reached out directly to learn more, and will update if they provide additional information.

Update: Nook developers will get 70 percent, pretty much par for the course:

Developers will receive  70% revenue share from IAP transactions within their apps.  This is standard across all platforms.

- Claudia Romanini, Vice President, NOOK Apps

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Video sharing startup Vilynx launched to enable its users to quickly and easily manage videos that they have shot and stored across multiple devices. Linking in to a wide range of cloud storage devices, and with a ready stable of mobile apps, the company hopes to make users’ personal video assets easily accessible wherever they are. That now extends into the living room, thanks to the company’s first launch of an app for connected TV devices.

Today, Vilynx is making its video sharing platform available on Google TV, allowing families to watch and share all their favorite videos from the largest screen in the house. The new app for TV screens makes it one of the first personal video apps to show up on the platform, and extends its reach beyond just being available on the web and on a bunch of mobile devices.

Vilynx had previously released apps for all the major mobile platforms, including iOS, Android and the Kindle Fire, as well as a web presence. And it’s connected to a bunch of cloud storage providers, including Dropbox, Box, and Google Drive, to enable users to manage their videos and access them no matter which service they use.

More than that, the company seeks to make videos easy to find and watch and share by automatically creating smart thumbnails that contain four screenshots instead of just one. The idea is that it will enable users to quickly identify which videos they want to watch, even in a series that are shot near one another or share the same background.

It also provides a way for users to share videos with one another, via email, SMS, and social networks. But the idea is that they can do so privately, so that only family and friends that they want to see their videos can and not the whole wide world as in some video-sharing apps.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

How low will Amazon’s tablets go? We’re now hearing that a $99 Kindle Fire 7″ tablet is in production, and will be shipping this year. At a price that low, the Kindle Fire would be able to more easily compete at the tail end of the Android-based tablet market – an area which is today dominated by low-cost tablets out of China, often sold at the sub-$100 price point.

According to what we’ve heard, the $99 Kindle Fire HD will also still sport a TI processor like the rest of the lineup, and will have a 1280

Amazon introduced Whispercast for Kindle back in October of 2012, and now the service is getting an update that allows it to deploy not just books and documents, but also apps. that means organizations like schools and businesses can now widely deploy apps across a number of Kindle Fire devices quickly and easily.

The service improves on the previous way of getting the same app onto a number of different Kindle Fire tablets owned by a single group, which actually required a manual install using everyone’s individual user account. Now, they can not only push out apps from the Amazon Appstore to all of their target devices, but they can also use Whispercast to send an invite to employees who have their own BYOD Kindle Fires. Once those employees join up with the program, they can be gifted the relevant Fire apps direct to their existing accounts.

It’s a pretty convenient feature, and free to use, which makes it all the more attractive. Back when Amazon first debuted Whispercast, it was pretty clear they were trying to make the decision about which platform to choose for broad device deployment easier. Schools benefit immensely from this kind of wide deployment, which, partnered with the Kindle Fire’s lower cost of entry, might help it become a more attractive option for organizations who might otherwise be leaning towards iPads.

Apple offers centralized app distribution to a range of deployed iPads via third-party MDM solutions, but now with Whispercast’s expansion into app territory it can offer some of those same functions without requiring third-party software or solutions, though it is less flexible and extensible than many MDM offerings. It was a natural next step for Amazon to introduce app deployment to Whispercast, so now that it’s here it’ll be interesting to watch if this moves the needle on institutional Kindle Fire adoption.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Amazon just announced that it would be dropping the price of the 8.9-inch version of its Kindle Fire HD. The tablet will now cost $269 for the Wi-Fi only version and $399 for the Wi-Fi and LTE version. The Kindle Fire HD 8.9″ is now available in the UK, Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Japan as well. Canada won’t get the device this time around.

The Kindle Fire HD was already available in Europe, but only the 7-inch version. With today’s news, Android tablets will become more widely available and could represent a bigger market share in Europe and Japan.

Amazon may have needed more time to ramp up production before releasing the Kindle Fire HD 8.9″ in other countries. Even though it is less popular than its cheaper brother, the tablet received a price cut as well. John Biggs found it a bit too big to use it comfortably.

Many Android tablet apps are still scaled-up smartphone apps. Developers need Android tablets to catch on in order to start considering it as a separate platform. IDC predicted that shipments of Android tablets may overtake those of the iPad in 2013. It could represent a turning point for mobile developers and startups.

While Amazon still hasn’t released its rumored smartphone, the company offers a wide range of tablets, from small form factors to bigger LTE tablets. Releasing an Android app in the Amazon Appstore is now an important step — Google Play isn’t enough if you want to target a large number of tablets.

As always, Amazon doesn’t release sales figures and it is difficult to predict whether the Kindle Fire product line is popular. If that is the case, it means that Google’s strategy with Android is not succeeding. Amazon forked Android to release its own tablet operating system, leaving behind many Google apps and services.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Google just announced that it is rolling out a new design for its Gmail mobile web app for Android, iOS, Blackberry and Kindle Fire. The new design looks very similar to Gmail’s recently relaunched iOS apps, with a generous amount of whitespace and larger fonts and icons.

The web app now also features Gmail for iOS’s improved search tool and calendar integration. This means the mobile web app now also offers auto-complete predictions for your searches, and it’s much easier to RSVP to Calendar invites than before.

The Gmail Offline app for Chrome, which is essentially a widescreen version of the mobile app that gives you a two-pane view of your inbox, will also get the same design update.

Here is Google’s full update:

A refreshed look for Gmail on mobile web and Gmail Offline

Since launching the rebooted Gmail app for iPhone and iPad in December (http://goo.gl/2m7pd), we’ve heard from many of you that you like the redesigned UI, along with new features such as improved search and integration with Google Calendar. Today we’re rolling out a similar refreshed look to the Gmail mobile web app as well as Gmail Offline (http://goo.gl/0f1ae) that includes many of these same changes. Try it out at gmail.com in the browser of your Android, iOS, Blackberry or Kindle Fire device. #MobileMonday

Article courtesy of TechCrunch