A year into its India journey, global e-commerce retailer and e-reading device maker, Amazon, says that getting publishers to work seriously on India-specific pricing and working with them to get more content digitised is on the company’s “shortest current list of priorities”.
While at present the company appears to be more focussed on its growing e-commerce marketplace in India, Amazon’s top executives told The Hindu that the company’s vision for India includes being able to make deeper inroads into the content business, including the vital education sector.
Grandinetti Russell, Vice President, Kindle Content, said that though it’s early days for the company in India, the short-term plan is focussed on getting the English language digital content game right and in the long-term being able to get books in as many regional Indian languages as possible on the platform. “Even in the English language, we still have a long way to go to bring all the local titles that should be there, and in getting more books digitised. The second is, of course, to make books available at prices that are a good balance between consumer interest and business outcome. Getting publishers to be thoughtful about their pricing in India is on our shortest list of priorities today,” he said, alluding to alternate business models that will be required to be able to facilitate lower pricing for the Indian market.
Focus on educationIn terms of content, Amazon has its eyes set on the vast untapped potential offered by the education sector in India. While the company does not yet have a concrete roadmap on this, Mr. Russel said that the education sector offered an interesting opportunity, with professional education such as scientific, law, engineering and medical being potential focus areas within this. “We hope over time to find the right partners in India, and elsewhere to be able to explore this further. There are a few challenges as the content can be complex, but we see it as an important sector.”
He compared what could be done in India to what the company has been able to do with the Ministry of Education in Brazil, where it has used its enterprise education technology Whispercast to deliver textbooks to students and teachers across Brazil. “This could be done in India, and there is vast potential. The solution works on hardware that isn’t ours and so can be widely deployed.”
India is one of the 11 new geographies, apart from the U.S. and the U.K., which the company has expanded into since 2011. While the company does not disclose sales figures for the country, device sales have been steadily picking pace with Amazon selling Kindle e-readers and tablets here. Amazon’s most recent foray into the hardware segment, the digital media-streaming device Fire TV, is yet to release in India.
Amazon remained non-committal on a date for an India release, as executives across the board maintained silence on the much in-the-news plans to unveil a new Amazon smartphone.
(The correspondent is in Seattle at the invitation of the company)
