Shortly after announcing that they plan to exit the PC business, Sony also revealed that the company will be exiting out of the eReader business. Despite having released Reader, the companies eReader prior to Kindle, Sony was never able to gain much market share after Amazon entered the market and was able to lower priced products. While not being able to compete with Amazon’s low priced Kindles, Sony was also squeezed out of the high end market, thanks to the iPad and eventually iPad mini. While exiting a business and dropping an entire product line traditionally takes some time, Sony’s time table for this transition is far more aggressive.

The electronic giant has announced that by late March, all Reader accounts (including library content) will be moved to Kobo’s platform. Sony insists that the migration process between the two services will be painless and customers of Reader will receive an email with step-by-step instructions. Ken Orii, Vice President of Digital Reading Business Division, Sony Electronics:

 Kobo is the ideal solution for our customers and will deliver a robust and comprehensive user experience. Like Sony, they are committed to those most passionate about reading and share our vision to use open formats so people can easily read anytime and anywhere. Our customers can be assured that they will have a seamless transition to the Kobo ecosystem and will be able to continue to access and read the titles they love from Sony devices. 

Under this transition Sony will have Kobo’s app pre-installed on select Xperia devices as the company will discontinue support and development on their Reader app on Android as well as iOS.

Discuss:

Is Sony making a good move by shedding off their Reader business?

[Via PR NewsWire]