AUO aims for $100 e-book readers by 2011
By Donald Melanson 
posted October 2nd 2009 1:29PM
posted October 2nd 2009 1:29PM
E-book readers have certainly been getting better and cheaper lately, but it looks like display-maker AUO thinks there's still plenty of room for improvement, and it's now promising to cut the price of 'em fully in half within two years. The key to that, obviously, is to make the displays cheaper, which AUO says it can do by not only improving the technology, but by taking advantage of the sheer scale of its production capabilities. That, it says, could allow for a $150 e-book reader by next year, and a $100 reader by 2011. What's more, AUO also says that it expects both Amazon and Sony to get "some" of their displays from AUO (with the rest coming from industry leader Prime View) which, if you put two and two together, could pave the way for some cheaper Kindles and Sony Readers in the not too distant future.
Aimes?
Tee hee!
$150 readers sometime in 2010? What a bold predictiton. If anything it seems way too conservative. I am looking at my Fry's ad this morning and see the Sony Pocket Reader for $179. It may be small and it may not have a 3G network, but it has one of the better e-ink screens available and it is already within $29 of that supposed $150 mark. Combine that with ASUS and Plastic Logic both expecting to drop their readers in 4 Q this year and I wouldn't be surprised if the lower end readers aren't selling for $150 by January. Amazing what a little competition in the arena can do for prices.
Same goes for a public healthcare option :)
After the whole Amazon fiasco, I still want some type of open-source code so that we can run a custom firmware where auto-intrusion is not enabled.
So just get any of the readers that don't have wifi/cell network features. No radio, no intrusion possible. Especially if you use third party software like Calibre to manage your library.
Price war!!!
There go the margins...
I expect enormous lag from these.
Away with the printed page think of the saving in just trees alone. Not counting the cut in production of ink. I am all for e-readers we waste way too much and I can say this is a good thing.
I'll still be able to read my books when the EMPs go off.
We have 3 each eBook readers in the house (Kindle II, Sony PRS-505, Sony PRS-700), and though they all function rather as they should, they each seem terribly over-priced for the technology that they offer.
E-Ink technology (in all of its monochrome mediocre-ness) can not possibly cost so much to manufacture/produce that these things justify such exorbitant pricing.
Until they drop well into the 100.00 to 150.00 price point they'll (probably) never see any mass-market acceptance, so this is a good move on the industry's part.
It's still a relatively immature technology, and we're still in the early-adoption phase where prices always come at a premium. You can see with the continual shuffling of features -- touch, wireless, screen sizes, etc -- that the manufacturers are still figuring out the marketplace, not to mention that the eInk technology itself is still developing -- most notably in terms of refresh rates.
I think we are finally beginning to see the ramp up towards mass market penetration, which is why prices will surely drop as predicted above in the next couple of years.
Quoted for truth. As far as I can tell, they're just screens with low storage.
@Bronzus: You didn't quote anything (thankfully). And these aren't 'just screens', they're e-ink screens - which are still relatively new (and somewhat sketchy) technology, as noted in Tacitus's informative reply. The rest of the device might cost virtually nothing but the screen's still expensive.
(And actually, current prices at around $200 aren't all that excessive for low-powered but tiny computing devices, even ignoring the new screen technology. Compare to [unlocked] mobile phones, which have similar processing power; it's not that much more expensive. Or compare to video game handhelds. Again, similar computing power and similar price.)
I hate to say it, but it will take an Apple to get the ebook reader (and business model) right , books in itune store? very likely.
no no no, we need them to be CHEAP!
I hope they manage to make good on the $100 price point. The main thing putting me off on all the ebook readers on the market now is they're just too damn expensive.
When will the displays be full color?
Terry Thomas...
the photographer
Atlanta, Georgia USA
www.TerryThomasPhotos.com
no, Terry-Thomas was an English comedy actor. Check wikipedia.
also my question - when will people stop complaining about ebook readers not being full colour? do these people actually read? or do they only read comics? i read maybe a hundred novels last year (paper, I don't have an ebook reader) and what percentage of those were printed in colour? That's right, 0%.
even when e-ink screens are colour the colour will be shit for years; it's hardly going to replace the coffee-table book. that isn't what ebook readers are for.
@sam Actually, Terry Thomas is someone who likes to spam us with his photo website with blurb that is 80% of his post.
Regarding colour e-ink, I agree that B&W (or very limited colour) is where the market will remain for quite a while, and as you say, for readers of books (I know numbers are dwindling) that is fine anyway.
If you look at the cost break down of these ereaders from eetimes and the like you'll see that there are 0 to negative margins on these products already. BTW they processor they use are way way lower than a cell phone, and nothing like a smart phone. Sony uses a dragon ball processor - you may remember one of the late adopters of that technology the Palm Pilot 5000 only about 14 years ago. The displays are 2 - 3x more expensive than a comparable LCD. eInk and Sipix, the technology AUO is using is way way way slow. BTW it won't get any faster as some small things called physics get in the way, Die based materials moving through liquid is not very fast. When it does it get faster it is done by increasing the scan rate and increasing the voltage. What the eInk screens also use 40V versus what 3V for LCD. The pictures don't show you the flashing screen. Yea it new technology they have only been working on it for 14 or so years. Can't wait for its 20 year anniversary.
Um...aren't refurb kindle 1's selling for $150?