La pratique en étonnera certains, mais le dernier communiqué de presse d’Amazon (ci-dessous) laisse transparaître toute la joie dans laquelle baigne actuellement la firme de Seattle. En effet, le Kindle vient de battre un record de vente durant le seul mois de novembre. En effet, le reader d’Amazon figure toujours parmi le produit le plus vendu, toutes catégories confondues. Une belle prouesse quand on sait que la clientèle d’Amazon aux Etats-Unis dépasse les 180 millions d’Américains. En revanche, Amazon n’indique pas précisément combien de ses readers ont été vendus. En tout cas, avec cette annonce, la fin de l’année semble marque une étape bien particulière dans le développement du marché des dispositifs de lecture. Le fameux tipping point a été dépassé, et cela même avant l’arrivée de produit très attendus, comme l’hypothétique tablette Apple ou encore le Nook.

D’ailleurs, si Barnes&Noble ne semble pas à plaindre car le Nook est toujours victime de son succès, le grand libraire américain vient de se voir obligé de repousser l’arrivée en magasin du reader. Alors qu’il devait être initialement arriver dans les rayons le 30 novembre, il arrivera que le 7 décembre et uniquement dans certaines boutiques (dont B&N n’a pas dévoilé les noms). A moins d’un mois des fêtes de Noël, ce retard et la rupture de stock inévitable risque de bénéficier à Amazon. Si certains acheteurs potentiels du Nook préféreront attendre la sortie du reader de B&N, l’image de marque du Kindle et ses arguments de vente risque de faire pencher les indécis pour ce dernier. Les premiers tests du Nook seront déterminants pour retarder certains achats et compenser l’absence de readers en magasins pour que les clients potentiels découvrent le reader.

Est-ce la chronique d’un lancement raté? Sans suivre Gizmodo dans les extrêmes (“This is only gonna get more ridiculous, just watch.”), on se demande quand même si Barnes&Noble va réussir à fournir un service à la hauteur des prétentions de son reader.

Le communiqué de presse d’Amazon :

Kindle Breaks Record for Sales in a Single Month During November
Kindle is the Hottest Gift This Holiday Season Across All Amazon Product Categories-Not Just Electronics

SEATTLE–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Nov. 30, 2009–

Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) today announced that November is already the best sales month ever for Kindle, even before Cyber Monday. Kindle continues to be the most wished for, the most gifted, and the #1 bestselling product across all product categories on Amazon. The latest generation Kindle – just released in October – is $259 and available for immediate shipment today at www.amazon.com/kindle. “Kindle is a great gift for anyone who loves to read and it’s flying off the shelves faster than any other product Amazon sells,” said Ian Freed, Vice President, Amazon Kindle. “We’re seeing lots of people buying from one to a handful of Kindles as gifts for friends or family, as well as many businesses and other organizations buying Kindles in large quantities for their employees or customers.”

Kindle is the revolutionary portable reader that wirelessly downloads books, magazines, newspapers and personal documents to a crisp, high-resolution 6-inch electronic ink display that looks and reads like real paper. Kindle utilizes the same 3G wireless technology as advanced cell phones, so users never need to hunt for a Wi-Fi hotspot. The latest generation Kindle with Global Wireless enables readers to wirelessly download content in over 100 countries and territories.

About Amazon.com Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN), a Fortune 500 company based in Seattle, opened on the World Wide Web in July 1995 and today offers Earth’s Biggest Selection. Amazon.com, Inc., seeks to be Earth’s most customer-centric company, where customers can find and discover anything they might want to buy online, and endeavors to offer its customers the lowest possible prices. Amazon.com and other sellers offer millions of unique new, refurbished and used items in categories such as Books; Movies, Music & Games; Digital Downloads; Electronics & Computers; Home & Garden; Toys, Kids & Baby; Grocery; Apparel; Shoes & Jewelry; Health & Beauty; Sports & Outdoors; and Tools, Auto & Industrial. Amazon Web Services provides Amazon’s developer customers with access to in-the-cloud infrastructure services based on Amazon’s own back-end technology platform, which developers can use to enable virtually any type of business. Examples of the services offered by Amazon Web Services are Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2), Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3), Amazon SimpleDB, Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS), Amazon Flexible Payments Service (Amazon FPS), Amazon Mechanical Turk and Amazon CloudFront. Amazon and its affiliates operate websites, including www.amazon.com, www.amazon.co.uk, www.amazon.de, www.amazon.co.jp, www.amazon.fr, www.amazon.ca, and www.amazon.cn. As used herein, “Amazon.com,” “we,” “our” and similar terms include Amazon.com, Inc., and its subsidiaries, unless the context indicates otherwise.

Forward-Looking Statements This announcement contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Actual results may differ significantly from management’s expectations. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that include, among others, risks related to competition, management of growth, new products, services and technologies, potential fluctuations in operating results, international expansion, outcomes of legal proceedings and claims, fulfillment center optimization, seasonality, commercial agreements, acquisitions and strategic transactions, foreign exchange rates, system interruption, inventory, government regulation and taxation, payments and fraud. More information about factors that potentially could affect Amazon.com’s financial results is included in Amazon.com’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and subsequent filings. Kindle devices are sold through Amazon Digital Services, Inc.

Source: Amazon.com, Inc. Amazon.com, Inc.