South Africa’s e-reader market received a shake-up this month when Pick n Pay announced that it was bringing the Kobo Touch e-reader to SA for R995. By comparison, the Kindle Touch 3G, which was recently launched in South Africa, retails at R2 699.

Obviously, these products are not strictly comparable, but even an entry-level Kindle in South Africa costs R1499 and a Kindle Touch with Wi-Fi, but no 3G, retails at R1 999.

It is clear that, in comparison, the Kobo Touch looks like an attractive e-reader option.

But what is the international picture of the e-reader market?

According to analyst firm Gartner, 11m e-readers were being used globally in 2011. Gartner predicted that this figure would rise to 16,3m by the end of this year, a 48% increase.

Of this market, Amazon’s Kindle enjoys a share of nearly 60%, Barnes and Nobles’s Nook holds a 25% share and Japanese company Rakuten’s Kobo is hanging in there with a 10% share.

Kobo is a Canadian-based, Japanese-owned e-reader company that has its own e-book service, just like the relationship between Amazon and Kindle.

The Kobo store claims to have 3m e-books, a million of which are free. The company also says it has a wider, more diverse offering than even Amazon.

Kobo also says it has 10m registered users across 190 countries, but as one can see from the number of e-readers in the market, only 1,1m of these registered customers have Kobo e-readers. The others must be downloading e-books to their laptops, desktops, phones or tablets.

In South Africa, Kobo is predicting that it will take 50% of the e-reader market in the next 12 months, threatening Kindle’s domination.

It is an ambitious target, but with the South African market still in its infancy, the establishment of a firm foothold is an imperative.

Pick n Pay has signed a six-month exclusive deal with Kobo and the e-readers are on sale in 41 of the retailer’s stores and on the Pick n Pay website. The deal will also see Pick n Pay earning a percentage of all e-books bought on devices purchased in its stores.

Pick n Pay marketing director Bronwen Rohland said there was no getting away from the fact that the world was becoming increasingly digitally focused.

Kobo CEO Michael Serbinis said: “We are excited to enter a new continent and happy to be able to do so in partnership with Pick n Pay. Together, we hope to transform the digital publishing market by making more e-books available to more people throughout South Africa.” — (c) 2012 Mail & Guardian