Today is an exciting and long-anticipated day for us here at Kobo!
We renamed, rebranded from Shortcovers to Kobo, and launched a new web site and mobile apps early this morning. Kobo is an anagram of “book”, and a name that we think will resonate globally. Here is why that is important….
We’ve spent the past year assembling a group of investors that can offer the retail and mobile distribution channels needed to build a leading global eReading brand. Today marks a major shift in the global eReading landscape. We have a massive opportunity in front of us, and we look forward to Kobo powering eReading services everywhere.
Kobo is now officially a global eReading service backed by Indigo Books & Music, Borders (US), REDGroup Retail (AU), and Instant Fame, a subsidiary of Cheung Kong Holdings, a global investment conglomerate with interests in retail and telecommunications. Today, we raised $16M from our founding and majority shareholder, Indigo Books & Music and these leading partners who will also give us distribution on four continents by the end of 2010. Our vision is to deliver any book on any device, and we strongly believe that you as a customer should have choice.
You should choose Kobo, and here’s why:
- You can use any device – your smartphone, computer, tablet, eReader or any other device you choose. You can try it for free- without having to commit to buy an expensive device. As of today our free apps have been downloaded over 1M times…and still counting!
- We have over 2 million titles – with US$9.99 bestsellers and over 1.8M free titles.
- We are open standards based – we support open standards like ePub and you can buy from us and use on other devices, or software – not just ours!
- We are global – We have users in over 200 countries today. We will bring Kobo powered partners to market globally throughout 2010, so you can try eReading anywhere you shop today.
You can also count on continued, relentless innovation, at top speed. A number of advances are coming soon, including dedicated eReaders, newspapers & magazines, innovations in the reading experience and more. We expect to bring dedicated eReaders to our customers and partners starting in the first half of 2010 and will release more details soon.
We have a massive opportunity in front of us in a dynamic market, and with our partners we look forward to serving the eReading needs of customers everywhere.
{ 5 trackbacks }
{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
There have been rumours for some time that Indigo was going to release its own e-reader. Is there any word on that? I would love an alternative to those available to date. Either they’re restrictive in their source content, or the hardware is insanely expensive. We need something that is both functional yet not over-priced. So far, I’m very impressed with Kobo, keep up the good work!
This is very exciting news indeed! I’ve been waiting for a company like Kodo to come along and change the eBook landscape. I know you’ll do well. Hire me.
“You can use any device” … except those based on Symbian or WinMo.
And I see that those two platforms, though present on the Shortcovers device list in the “coming soon” category, have curiously disappeared from your lineup now that you’re Kobo.
Humm?
Thanks. I love reading books on my phone and I’ve been reading a few free books (via ShortCovers.) I finally purchased a book on Kobo yesterday, (12/15/09) it’s a book that I already have but I wanted it on my phone so that I can finish reading it! LOL – I find reading on my phone a lot easier and more fun than holding a big book or even a big E reader because that’s just something xtra I need to carry around. No thanks.
I’m new to this. I have the Palm Pre and a BlackBerry and I love how it doesn’t matter which phone I decide to read from. Thanks a bunch and thanks for not having any issues with the download and my credit card! That’s awesome. I can’t wait to download more books. By the way… what’s your stock symbol? 
This is a good idea for eBooks, however I’m still not interested in renting books. Publishers need to start thinking about providing the eBook content WITH the physical book. Once the eBook has been read, the data is worthless.
Hi! I was just over at the kobo website to check out the free ebooks, but was disappointed that I could only read them online. Is there no way for me to save an ebook to my PC?
nicks – you can download any of our books that say they are available in ‘epub’ or ‘pdf’. Not all our books are available in those formats, but a vast majority are.
You can also read our books on your mobile devices.
More details here: http://kobobooks.com/ebooks
i am very excited about e-books, but I am really disappointed I cant use my chapters/indigo gift cards to pay for things. Considering this is the “official” ebook site for them, you wouldnt think that would be a problem…
Fantastic!! Thanks for the ability to read my epub files on my Sony eReader, my iPhone, desktop computer and WEB (any way I want)! Excellent.
One suggestion: Please add a ‘Wish List’ function.
Gee… are you going to use any of that $16 million to fix the search engine? The darned thing is so frustrating to use that I feel compelled to use the more user friendly sites to make purchases.
I am wondering whatever happened to the free ebook of the week? For two weeks it was the same one – Sway, and now – nothing. What gives?
I am writing from http://ebooks.addall.com/
which meta search 30+ ebook sites with one click.
I did try to contact shortcovers.com before to see if you want to be searched but didn’t get any reply. Please contact me at info_AT_addall.com (replace the _AT_ with “@”)
There seem to be no magazine or newspaper subscriptions through your service. Is this coming?
Loving KOBO. I use an iPhone and, because I am site impaired, I use the voice over screen reader that is included. The KOBO app and books are accessible. Thanks for making such a great product.