Sony appears to have been surprised by demand for its new Reader Daily Edition and may not be able to satisfy orders in time for Christmas.
Pre-sale orders opened today for the eReader and Sony is expected to announce newspaper and magazine content partners in about three weeks’ time. But Steve Haber, president of its digital reading division, told us Sony could not guarantee delivery by Christmas to those ordering early.
“We’re showing a window of shipping – December 18 through the first week of January,” he said.
“We have a ‘Notify Me’ page on our website for the Daily Edition and the quantity of people that asked to be notified [about its availability] has been significant.
“We’re deeply concerned we won’t have enough to get them under the Christmas tree, so we’re giving a range and telling people upfront that we may not get to everybody over Christmas. We may be able to do it, we just don’t want to over-promise.”
The seven-inch screen of the $400 Daily Edition, following the five-inch Pocket Edition and six-inch Touch edition, lends itself to the larger formats of newspapers and magazines.
It also has permanent wireless connectivity for downloads through the AT&T network, mirroring the functionality of Amazon’s Kindle.
Mr Haber did not reveal the names of any content partners, but Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp, owner of the Wall Street Journal, seems certain to be one of them.
On recent earnings calls, Mr Murdoch has complained about the revenue share with Amazon on the Kindle and said News Corp was in active discussions with Sony.
At a Goldman Sachs conference in September, he said: “We will have very good terms there and we will be doing everything we can to drive that one.”
Neither Amazon nor Sony are issuing sales figures for their eReaders. Sony said in January it sold a total of 400,000 over two years, in 2007 and 2008, but it has clammed up since Amazon did not reciprocate by revealing Kindle sales.
“That [400,000] number is extremely small compared to where we are today If everyone starts sharing, we’ll share [numbers],” said Mr Haber.
“Forrester [Research] is estimating 3m units [for the eReader industry] this year, so it’s in the millions now.”
