Thursday, April 02, 2009

E-BOOKS OPEN NEW CHAPTER FOR LCD MAKERS

Taipei
The Economic Times

Ask C.T. Liu about future growth engines for his company, LCD maker AU Optronics, and he whips out his Kindle e-book in lieu of an answer.

Strong reception for the Kindle, the brainchild of Web retailer Amazon, is attracting a growing number of developers looking to tap interest in devices that let consumers read newspapers, magazines and books in a digital form that updates wirelessly and saves paper.

Sony Corp has joined the paperless wave with its own e-readers, partnering with Google to offer public domain books that are no longer protected by copyright.

Other believers in the dawn of a paperless age include Taiwan's Netronix, which is making similar models with touchscreens, and Dutch Polymer Vision, set to soon introduce a pocket e-reader with rollable displays.

"We see it as a new industry," said Liu, a senior vice president at AU, the world's No.3 LCD maker whose panels are part of Dell, Hewlett-Packard and Apple PCs, as well as Sony LCD TVs.

"It replaces paper, printing, publishing, text books, and so on," said Liu, in charge of AU's consumer display business.

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