Bangalore-based online retailer Flipkart.com announced its foray into the eBooks category through its digital store Flyte. The company founded in 2007 had launched its digital music store in February this year.
Flipkart said, Flyte has a selection of over 100,000 books at highly attractive prices and said the e-book offering will change the reading habits of Indian book lovers. With this e-book offering, a user can now buy and read their favourite books instantly on their mobile devices.
Sameer Nigam, VP-digital at Flipkart.com, said, “We have a growing, tech-savvy reader base that is constantly on the go -– and they are looking for options to buy and read their favourite books on their mobile devices instantly.”
According to industry reports the US and European markets were the early adopters of eBooks and the market share for digital trade books is currently at 50%. In the US, the eBooks market recently crossed $1 billion in annual sales.
Presently, the e-book service is available for android devices and the users can download Flyte e-books app from the Google Play.
The app is presently available for Android OS but the application for Windows 8 will be launched soon, the company said. The Flyte also offers a free sample of each book on the website and mobile app and a user can read an eBook on up to six devices. To encourage Indian readers to try eBooks, Flyte is pricing its eBooks starting at Rs 30, besides providing 4,000 free titles.
Recently, Landmark, a part of Tata Group’s retail arm Trent, has launched an e-books section to its readers on its website. In August, Flipkart raised around $150 million from investors like Nasper and Iconiq Capital, as well as existing ones in Tiger Global and Accel Partners.
