Amazon to create a device other than Kindle, says report

By Carl Bagh: Subscribe to Carl's RSS feed

August 11, 2010 11:33 AM EDT

Amazon shifts focus as its new plan is to manufacture hardware other than e-book Kindle, the New York Times' Bits blog reported.

Citing sources with direct knowledge, it reported that Amazon's division Lab 126 - the division which designed Kindle - is attempting to design new hardware which can carry Amazon's content, which includes music, movies and digital books.

Currently, the job listings at Lab 126 offer profiles such as Supply Chain Project Manager, Hardware Engineer and RF Systems Engineer. Most of these people hired for these positions will probably work for next generation Kindle with touch screens or color versions of Kindle. But many may also end up working for the new hardware.

One of the person with direct knowledge of the product said that "hardware products would be a means to an end" to allow easy access to its content.

The current strategy to weave hardware products around its content comes after a host of companies entered the digital content market. Thus with less differentiation available in the product being offered it's a logical move by Amazon to design new products to differentiate it in the realm of the delivery of products.

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With its current success of Kindle, Amazon can surely slice away a portion of the digital content market by offering diverse products around its content or by building a product like a tablet that can allow customers access to its content.

In the tablet PC market it has sufficient competition from the likes of iPad and Dell Streak. However, Amazon can leverage on its cloud-based computing services and available content to develop hardware close to these assets. It can re-work the whole supply chain dynamics - which gave it a competitive edge by delivering books at customers' doorstep.

Thus, by offering a new product around its content Amazon can also leverage on its one-click strategy that triggers the whole online transaction with the click of an icon, not to mention its own unique cataloguing system that makes search through its range of products including books easier.

Just as Apple devised its iPod around its iTunes music library and Amazon built Kindle around its digital books, there are many other options like music and movies available on Amazon. But the pressing choice will be between a product around a single feature and a holistic product that can allow access to complete content.

This article is copyrighted by International Business Times, the business news leader