Near the end of a recent flight to Los Angeles, the flight attendant’s voice on the plane’s intercom asked passengers to “power down your books” for landing.

Just a couple of years ago those words would have elicited curious laughs. Yet on this flight there wasn’t even a murmur; just the smooth clicks and swipes of power buttons on Kindles and iPads.

As I wrote in a post last week about the rise of mobile devices, the e-reader market has skyrocketed over the past few years, with analysts estimating that consumers will buy 19.5 million of them in 2010. The number should reach 150 million by 2013.

But the industry still can’t decide what these devices will look like in the future. Will they end up as dedicated black-and-white devices for reading books, or tablets that are more like computers and move beyond traditional books to include video, apps and the Web? Barnes & Noble has decided to place bets on both horses, selling a black-and-white e-ink reader and now a new color device.

The company’s latest product, the Nook Color, costs $250, comes with a 7-inch color LCD screen and uses a variation of the Google Android operating system. It blurs the line between a classic e-reader and a tablet computer by adding built-in applications that go beyond reading.

Although it is still unclear if the color version will be a hit, William Lynch, chief executive of Barnes & Noble, said at a press conference Tuesday that the company had sold over 1 million Nooks since the device was introduced last year.

That numbers seems impressive until you compare it to other devices on the market that have little apple logos on the back.

The Apple iPad, which costs $500 and up, is clearly not just an e-reader, but a computer, e-reader and Web device all rolled into one, and it has fared extremely well with consumers so far. Apple said in its latest earnings report that it had sold over 7 million iPads in six months.

Then there is the approach taken by Sony, which is steadfast in its belief that consumers don’t want color. The e-ink screens on non-color readers can deliver crisper text than color LCDs and use much less power, but they can’t display moving images.

Phil Lubell, vice president of digital reading at Sony Electronics, said in an e-mail message that he believed consumers preferred “a crisp, glare-free e-ink screen that provides the most immersive reading experience possible.”

“Barnes and Noble’s new LCD tablet cannot be considered in the same category as a dedicated reading device,” Mr. Lubell said. “We’ve heard overwhelmingly from book lovers interested in e-readers that electronic paper is their No. 1 reason for choosing an electronic reading device.” (Of course, Barnes & Noble’s chief said during its press conference that customers had “asked for a color e-reader.”)

Although Sony declined to offer the exact number of e-readers it had sold to date, a Sony representative said the company had “passed the million-unit milestone a while ago.”

And of course there’s one more e-reader: the Amazon Kindle. Although not the first to enter the marketplace, the Kindle has definitely made one of the largest splashes.

An Amazon representative declined to comment about the company’s future plans for the Kindle, or the number of units the company has sold to date. Analysts believe Amazon has sold between 3 million and 6 million units since the first Kindle was introduced in 2007.

Don’t expect a color version of the scrappy Kindle anytime soon. Jeffrey P. Bezos, Amazon’s chief executive, has repeatedly said that color is “not ready for prime time” when it comes to next-generation e-readers. Mr. Bezos has also said in the past that color Kindles are “multiple years” away.

Holding out for a better color technology could be beneficial for Amazon and Sony, or it could completely backfire. As consumers continue to read more content on color devices that can handle video and deliver a more magazine-like experience, dedicated black-and-white readers could quickly become a niche product.

Although these companies can’t seem to agree on the perfect device, there is one thing that’s clear from the products being peddled: the competition and range of options in the marketplace will keep innovation moving forward and prices moving backward for years to come.

TOKYO, Sept 27 (Reuters) – Sharp Corp (6753.T) said on Monday it would launch an e-book service and tablet-style computer in Japan in December, taking on Apple Inc’s (AAPL.O) iPad and domestic rival Sony’s (6758.T) Reader.

Sharp’s GALAPAGOS reader will go on sale in December, and will initially offer access to about 30,000 books, newspapers and magazines, the company said at a launch event in Tokyo. It plans to expand its offering to include movies, music and games next year.

The launch of the new reader comes four months after the iPad was launched in Japan and is set to clash with a domestic offering from Sony. Japan’s powerful and conservative publishers have slowed efforts to create an e-book market in Japanese. [ID:nTOE63J034]

Sharp hopes to sell about 1 million units of the WiFi-only tablet in 2011. The gadget features Google’s (GOOG.O) Android operating system and comes with either a 5.5-inch or a 10.8-inch screen. Sharp did not reveal prices.

The firm is also considering launching the gadget overseas and is in negotiations with Verizon Communications (VZ.N) of the United States, Masami Obatake, director in charge of the company’s communications business, told reporters.

Sony has said it will launch its own reader and e-book service in Japan by the end of the year, in cooperation with telecoms operator KDDI Corp (9433.T), the Asahi Shinbun newspaper and printing company Toppan Printing Co (7911.T).

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Electronic readers have surged in popularity in recent years and will continue to gain traction with Americans, but they might remain a niche device coveted mostly by avid bibliophiles.

About eight percent of U.S. readers use an e-reader. But a Harris Interactive poll released on Wednesday showed that about 12 percent of Americans, or one in eight, said they are likely to get one in the next six months.

“With e-reader sales expected to continue to climb and as more devices now become available, it is inevitable that reading habits of Americans will change,” Harris said in a statement.

The poll of 2,775 U.S. adults, showed that e-reader owners were far likelier to buy books than other Americans.

About one fifth of e-reader users bought 21 or more books in the past year, far about the 12 percent of Americans overall who shopped at the same rate. E-books now make up about three percent of book sales but analysts expect that to quadruple by 2015.

According to consulting firm Forrester Research, Amazon.com’s Kindle, launched in 2007, has already sold about 5 million devices while Barnes & Noble Inc, the largest U.S. bookstore chain, has sold about 1 million “Nook” e-readers since its launch last year.

Other leading devices include Sony’s Reader and Apple Inc’s iPad computer tablet, which has e-reader capabilities.

Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple and Borders Group Inc, which does not make its own e-reader but sells the devices, are waging an all-out war for the growing e-books market, with devices a key part of their strategy.

For all their growing popularity, e-readers seem destined to remain popular mostly among the most avid bibliophiles. About three in five Americans questioned in the poll said they were not at all likely to buy an e-reader in the coming months.

Qualcomm has come to market with a display technology called Mirasol that it expects to power next-generation, color e-book readers. Mirasol relies on so-called Imod technology, which uses ambient light to generate images and colors.

Unless you’re Stephen Hawking, the scientific details will make your nose bleed. But Qualcomm says that e-readers with Mirasol displays will only need charging every two weeks or so, while providing crisp text and pictures even in direct sunlight.

Bad news, early adopters: You can’t buy a Mirasol e-reader yet. Qualcomm says to expect them to ship this year, with price, size and other details still TBD.

While e-readers and personal navigation devices may be popular “embedded device” gift items this year, their success also will drive the emerging sector to bring even more innovative products to market in the next 12 to 18 months. The potential of the space also will drive carriers to experiment with a variety of business models.

Hot devices ahead

Amazon’s Kindle electronic book reader was introduced into the market place two years ago, and is testament to the potential of marrying consumer electronics and wireless connectivity. And success breeds competition. Today, Barnes & Noble, Sony and others are introducing e-readers into the marketplace, each with cellular connectivity embedded into the consumer product. The Barnes & Noble Nook is already sold out for the holiday season, and the book chain is taking orders for January delivery.

Everyone interviewed for this article believes we will see more innovation in the e-reader market. Look for color support, perhaps comic books offered on e-readers, new form factors, including fold-up devices, and the like.

Jeff Orr, senior analyst for mobile devices at ABI Research, breaks the embedded devices category into six sections: PNDs, e-readers, personal media players, digital cameras, video camcorders and gaming devices. “Of the six categories, two are important today – the PND and e-book readers.”

TomTom and Garmin have both introduced personal navigation devices (PNDs) that offer driving directions and more, including real-time traffic updates, gas station location finders and price comparisons, and local search options like movie times, said Macario Namie, senior director, product marketing at Jasper Wireless. PNDs are priced in a number of ways, either as a two-year prepaid contract, or a three-month contract with the option to continue service. Jasper has carrier agreements with AT&T Mobility, Rogers Wireless in Canada, Telcel in Mexico and KPN in Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands.

A handful of embedded consumer electronics devices are in the marketplace today, but even more should be commercial by the “dads and grads” shopping season this summer, Namie said. One product set to hit the U.S. market early next year is a digital photo frame offered by Isabella Products on the AT&T Mobility network.

Digital picture frames with embedded cellular are likely to gain traction when Isabella Products introduces its Vizitme product early next year. The device primarily is a “gifted” product, geared at grandparents, and designed to be plug-and-play. For example, a family with a new grandchild buys the device and ships it off to the grandparents, who simply plug in the frame. The parents, who bought the device, can upload photos from their PC to the frame. “The grandparent didn’t have to set up Wi-Fi, or set security settings or register or accept anything,” Namie noted. The frame is already shipping in Japan. Beyond buying the device, customers will have to buy a service plan.

Other products are probably a little further out before consumer electronics manufacturers find the right mix of product and business model to hit the market.

Devices like digital camcorders and cameras will be an interesting space to watch because there is likely a need for consumers to offload their content from these devices, but there may be bandwidth constraints in offloading a video, for example, ABI’s Orr noted. Also, consumers may not have a good experience offloading the content because wireless networks have slower uplink speeds. “I like the category, though, because it breaks the mold,” Orr commented.

Gaming devices with embedded connectivity also are likely take off slowly because the business model is more complicated. While it may make sense for gamers to be able to download content from the network to play offline, multi-player gaming may take up too much bandwidth or be too expensive to gain traction – at least in the United States.

In Brazil, where most TVs are not high-definition widescreens and most families don’t have a lot of extra money to spend on an Xbox, some digital gaming devices are coming to market and may be successful, Jasper’s Namie said.

Business models

All of the players in the ecosystem are moving in tandem to drive the marketplace, Orr said. “One of the issues in the past has been the management of all of these non-phone,non-modem devices. How do you price it and how do you manage the service with so many players involved.”

Finding the right business model – that consumers will pay and that makes financial sense for all of the players in the process – is an important component if the space is to really take off.

“The Kindle is the poster child for looking at different business models,” said Mike Euland, VP and general manager, North America, at Telit Wireless Solutions Inc., which manufactures embedded modules. Amazon’s Kindle e-reader showed wireless operators that a pay-per-use business model works, Euland said.

“The business model feels like it’s starting to make sense,” said Steve Pazol, who leads nPhase, a joint venture between Verizon Wireless and Qualcomm, focusing on the machine-to-machine communications space. As such, carriers will begin to experiment with usage-based models, including advertising-sponsored options. The GSMA is working on an M2M initiative because it is complex and varies depending on the company or carrier branding the product and service. While the ecosystem likely will continue to experiment at perhaps as many as 30 business models, eventually ecosystem players will whittle that number down to four or five, Pazol predicted.

Competition ahead

Further, as the secteor develops, ABI’s Orr said he expects there to be more competition and more experimental pricing in this segment. For example, some e-reader users may want to be able to check their e-mail from the e-reader. He also expects to see competition in the space from netbooks and smartbooks. “There are those who will look for devices with general computing platforms like MIDs and smartbooks, that have all of these types of functions (like the embedded device segment) can be performed on them.”

LONDON — Qualcomm Corp. has shown off a 5.3-inch full-color non-volatile MEMS-based display and claims a slightly larger version, with a 5.7-inch diagonal size, will be found in an e-reader product to deploy in fall 2010. The display features 1,024 by 768 pixel resolution and around 220 pixels per inch.
“We have a brand partner for the e-reader space to be announced in the first quarter of 2010,” said Cheryl Goodman, director of marketing for Qualcomm MEMS Technologies, speaking at Qualcomm press day held in London.

The Mirasol technology, which Qualcomm (San Diego, Calif.) acquired in 2004, does not require a back-light and is reflective, making use of ambient light.

The technology is based on a MEMS structure combined with thin film optics to create interferometric modulation. The color display is thin and bi-stable so that power is only consumed when changing the status of display. This is a boon for e-reader type products where it can achieve great power savings. The display technology is also capable of running video at 30-frame per second.

In the past Qualcomm has provided 3G wireless modems to Amazon for use in the Kindle wireless reading device. Qualcomm announced an agreement with LG Electronics Inc. to begin the development of Mirasol-enabled handsets, in February 2009.

The Mirasol technology is in use in some cell phone products but only as monochrome and small displays.

Qualcomm has a dedicated display fabrication plant in the Lungtan Science Park in Taoyuan, Taiwan, that us operated on behalf of Qualcomm by Taiwan’s Cheng Uei Precision Industry Co. Ltd.

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Thirty-six years ago, Ben Foss conceived of a device that could read out text from printed pages to help him with his dyslexia. Tomorrow (Nov. 10) Foss will ship the product in his role as director of access technology for Intel’s digital health group.
The Intel Reader is a paperback-sized device that can take a picture of printed text with its 5 megapixel camera and convert it to speech. The company hopes the $1,499 system will serve millions of people with dyslexia and difficulty seeing printed text.

“I filed the first patents on this technology and have been the leader of the design team,” said Foss, one of 55 million people with dyslexia in the U.S.

“When I was growing up my technology was my mom” who would read to him from school books at night, he said. “I faxed papers to her from three states away when I was in college because I felt too embarrassed to let people in the dorm know I couldn’t read,” he added.

Intel’s Ben Foss holds the text-to-speech reader he designed to assist dyslexics and the visually impaired.

The Intel Reader is the third system launched by the Digital Health group Intel launched about five years ago to address emerging opportunities in medical electronics. The Mobile Clinical Assistant is a reference design for hospital workers, and the Intel Health Guide is a specialized home PC for monitoring chronic diseases at home.

Like its predecessors, the Intel Reader is a vehicle for the company’s chips. It uses an Atom processor and 4 Gbyte Intel flash drive as well as Intel’s Moblin mobile Linux operating system. The 4 Gbyte card can hold 600 processed page or 500,000 raw text pages.

Intel designed the device, has it built by contract manufacturers and has agreements to sell it through a handful of specialty dealers in the U.S. who cater to people with reading impediments. They include CTL, Don Johnston Inc., GTSI, Howard Technology Solutions and HumanWare.

Foss would not say whose text-to-speech software the device uses. The Intel Reader supports a list of specific speech formats including Daisy 2.02, NISO 2002 and NIMAS 1.1, suggesting possible partners.

The Intel Reader aims to address a wide variety of ad hoc reading needs from books and newspapers to instructions and poster. Some existing electronic readers sport text-to speech software, but they don’t support full speech-based menus or enlarge font sizes the way the Intel Reader does, Foss said.

The company is also providing a portable device to convert books into spoken word files. The Intel Portable Capture Station is a peripheral that captures a page every few seconds, has a docking port for the Reader and can be folded into the size of a small briefcase.

The Intel Reader has been endorsed by a number of organizations including the International Dyslexia Association. “The Intel Reader has the potential to significantly change the way millions of people with impaired vision function at work, at home and at school,” said Dorrie Rush, a marketing director for Lighthouse International, a non-profit advocacy group for the visually impaired, speaking in a prepared statement.

The Intel Reader holds as many as 600 text-to-speech ready pages and costs $1,499.

arnes & Noble, which has long left open the possibility of introducing its own electronic reader, is expected to unveil on Tuesday at a news conference in Manhattan what it is calling the Nook.

The device features color touch-screen controls and a gray-and-white reading display. It will cost $259, matching Amazon.com’s most recent price cut for its latest edition of the Kindle.

According to an advertisement that Barnes & Noble placed in the Oct. 25 issue of The New York Times Book Review and which was distributed to publishers on Monday, the Nook will permit readers to lend their digital books to friends and download books wirelessly.

A spokeswoman for Barnes & Noble declined to comment.

Barnes & Noble is jumping into a crowded market dominated by the Kindle. The Reader from Sony is the next most popular such device, but there are several others in the works, including electronic readers from iRex and Plastic Logic.

In July, Barnes & Noble created an e-bookstore on its Web site, BN.com, and it sells digital editions that can be read on the iPhone from Apple and the BlackBerry, as well as on computers and laptops.

The advertisement for the Nook says that consumers will be able to “access over one million e-books, newspapers and magazines.” About 500,000 of the books available at BN.com can be downloaded free, through an agreement with Google to provide electronic versions of public domain books that Google has scanned from university libraries. These editions are currently not available on the Kindle.

The Nook will feature the same kind of electronic ink technology used by Kindle and other devices. It will be sold in Barnes & Noble stores as well as on a Web site, nook.com.

The market for e-books is still small but growing fast. According to the Codex Group, a consultant to the publishing industry, the number of people who own e-readers is expected to roughly double to about 3.8 million by the end of this year, from about 1.6 million in August.