iPhone News Updated

Amazon buys iPhone e-reader business

Amazon.com Inc., which makes the popular Kindle electronic book reader, bought Lexcycle, a startup that makes e-book software for the iPhone.

Lexcycle, which is based in both Austin, Texas and in Portland, Ore., said on its company blog that it isn’t planning to change its Stanza application under Amazon’s ownership. The app lets people search for, buy and read books on their iPhones.

“We are excited to join forces with a company that has innovated on behalf of readers for over a decade and is a pioneer in ebooks,” Lexcycle said. No price was given in this deal.

Amazon started selling its $400 electronic book, the Kindle, in 2007. Unlike other e-readers, such as Sony’s, the Kindle has a wireless connection, which lets customers buy books, magazines or newspapers easily — a hallmark of Amazon’s philosophy of making buying as quick and easy as possible. Though the Sony e-reader has a sleeker design with far fewer buttons, to buy books with it, users have to plug it into a computer.

When Lexcycle’s free iPhone app came along, some saw this as a potential threat to Amazon’s dominance over the e-book market.

One difference between e-readers and the iPhone however, is in their screens and power consumption. E-readers tend to use non-backlit screens that can be read even in sunshine, and they require little or no power to keep the text visible on the screen. The iPhone is not as power-efficient for book reading.

Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), led by CEO, Chairman and President Jeff Bezos, who started the business, is based in Seattle.

[Thanks: http://www.bizjournals.com]

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