Update: Amazon buys Audible for $300 million
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Amazon.com has begun a new chapter in its battle for customers&#39; ears: it has agreed to pay $300 million for Audible, a seller of audio books that has a close relationship with Apple.Ten-year-old Audible sells spoken-word content such as audio books, magazines, and radio programs through a number of channels, including its Web sites in the U.S. and U.K. It has 80,000 titles in its catalog, and a further 20,000 through partner sites in France and Germany.Amazon began reselling Audible&#39;s content in 2000, and since 2002, Audible has also distributed audio books through Apple&#39;s iTunes Store, when it became Apple&#39;s exclusive supplier of spoken-word content. Apple modified the software in its iPods to allow &quot;bookmarking&quot; of Audible audio files.This chapter in the battle for listeners may yet have a happy ending for Apple, as the Audible team plans to continue and grow its relationship with the iTunes Store, according to Amazon spokesman Drew Herdener. But that goes for Audible&#39;s many other channel partnerships too: &quot;We plan to continue and grow all these relationships,&quot; Herdener said.Apple declined to comment on the deal.The main battle front between Apple and Amazon remains the sale of digital music free of the restrictions imposed by DRM (digital rights management) systems, where Amazon has been competing with Apple in the U.S. since September.When Apple opened its iTunes Store, the music it sold was wrapped in a layer of DRM to prevent copying, which incidentally tied the music to Apple&#39;s iPod players and iTunes software.Some record companies were unhappy that Apple limited the sales to its players in this way, and last May&#160;Apple began offering tracks from EMI without DRM&#160;for a small premium, later bringing the price down to the same $0.99 it charges for other tracks with DRM.&#160;Amazon joined the fray&#160;in September, selling music from EMI and Universal in MP3 format, without DRM,&#160;adding tracks from Warner to its catalog&#160;in December. It now offers 2.9 million DRM-free tracks, compared to 2 million DRM-free tracks in Apple&#39;s iTunes Store. Apple offers millions more tracks with DRM.Audible&#39;s audio books are wrapped in a layer of DRM, which Amazon does not plan to remove unless customers start to complain, Herdener said.&quot;Each media marketplace has its own business dynamics,&quot; he said.Amazon recently moved into the electronic book market with the launch of its Kindle e-reader, a device for downloading and displaying electronic books. Kindle also plays audio files, including those sold by Audible, making it a (much bulkier) competitor to the iPod.The $300 million price tag for Audible includes the assumption of outstanding stock option obligations. The companies expect to close the deal by April.
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Amazon.com Inc.&#39;s shares rose almost 9 percent yesterday after the company reported a record number of sales and said consumer electronics outstripped book sales for the first time in its 10-year history.
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Believe it or not, Microsoft isn't really serious in its bid to buy Yahoo, according to one financial analyst, who says the proposal is really just a ploy to fend off a potential deal between Yahoo and Amazon. Could he possibly be right? Probably not.
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[Frankfurt/London | Reuters News Service, 7 October 2004] - Google yesterday introduced a new search technology to help publishers sell books online, a fast-growing market dominated by Internet retailer Amazon.
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US internet giant Amazon.com is buying China's largest web retailer Joyo.com, in a deal worth $75m (Â£41m).
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Amazon.com Inc  on Friday said  its board authorized the repurchase of up to $1 billion of the  company's common stock over the next two years, and its shares  rose 3.2 percent before the bell.
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Fastest growing market Online bookseller Amazon is increasing investment in its Chinese business - where sales are growing faster than anywhere else.â¦
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Dow Jones &amp; Company, the publisher of The Wall Street Journal, has agreed to buy MarketWatch, the parent company of the financial news Web site CBS MarketWatch, for approximately $519 million, the companies said today.
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Technology products retailer CDW agreed to a private equity buyout worth 7.3 billion dollars in the latest in a wave of takeovers.
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Amazon and Pepsi are giving it away now.
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Amazon.com Inc.'s second-quarter profit more than tripled, boosted by strong sales of books, music and electronics worldwide. The Web retailer's stock soared 11.3 percent in after-hours trading.
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Amazon.com Inc. said Thursday it has agreed to buy Joyo.com Ltd., China's largest online retailer of books, music and videos, for $72 million.
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The deal is likely to mean that audiobooks will become the latest addition to its fast-growing music download store.
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Web retailer Amazon.com Inc. said Thursday it will buy online audio book seller Audible Inc. for $300 million in a bid to expand its reach in digital audio content.
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Acquisition of publisher Brilliance Audio should allow the web shopping giant to offer customers a greater selection of audio books.
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Online retailer Amazon.com   posted a sharp rise in third-quarter net profit on Tuesday,  helped by robust domestic and international sales and the  latest Harry Potter book.
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Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) said Thursday it has agreed to buy Joyo.com Ltd., China's largest online retailer of books, music and videos, for $72 million...