Kindle accounts for 10% of book sales

According to Piper Jaffray, worldwide Kindle revenues will reach $405 million by the end of 2009, and more than double to nearly $1 billion in 2010. To gauge the impact that Kindle is having on the book business and the general e-commerce space, consider what Mark Mahaney of Citigroup told TechCrunch: The device, first introduced in late 2007, accounted for approximately 10% of total North American book units sold in Q1 2009—or about 4 million out of the 38 million books sold. Importantly, people are increasingly willing to try e-book readers. Piper Jaffray found that 5% of consumers surveyed were interested in buying a digital book reader, and 9% were interested in buying one after a price drop. Nineteen percent of respondents had never seen a digital book reader but wanted to check one out.