Publishers Weekly is reporting that publisher Random House doubled its profits in the first half of 2010 because of two main factors:
- Stieg Larsson’s massively successful trilogy (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest): “Random has sold a combined 6.5 copies in the U.S. and Germany of his three books in print, e-book, and audio formats.”
- “a 300% increase in digital sales.”
Random House chairman Markus Dohle announced that the company is on track to generate ebook sales of over $100 million, mostly in the United States.
In other ebook news, Publishers Weekly also reports that Sony is releasing
a redesigned and upgraded suite of its three digital readers—the 5”screen Pocket Edition; 6” screen Touch Edition and 7”screen Daily Edition—offering full optical touch screen functionality, nonglare black & white e-ink display along with reduced size and weight. The new devices are not only stylish—they come in silver, black and pink aluminum skins—but also offer stepped up power, crisp page-turning and increased storage capacity. Only one model, the top of the line Daily Edition, offers 3G/wireless. The Pocket and Touch Editions will be available beginning today; the Daily Edition in November.
In a final bit of news, Amazon’s Kindle, already available in select Target stores, will be available in Staples stores this fall.
