According to Kobo’s bio:
“Kobo is a global eBook retailer backed by Indigo Books & Music, Borders, REDgroup Retail, Cheung Kong Holdings, and other leaders in technology and retail. We believe consumers should be able to read any book, anytime, anywhere, and on the device of their choice.”
Kobo is headquartered in Toronto, Canada. You can find their company profile on LinkedIn. Kobo is an ebook company that also sells an ereader. Kobo makes partnerships to help sell its ebooks in over 200 countries around the world from Canada to Australia. For a company founded in 2009, 2010 has seen a period of large growth for the company of 110 employees as Kobo began selling ebooks in the UK in February 2010 and then started selling ebooks in United States Borders book stores and in Wal-Marts in Canada in June 2010. Also in June, Kobo released a Kobo iPhone App. They also have apps available for Blackberry, Android, and HP/Palm Pre’. In July 2010 Kobo and Borders began selling ebooks online at Border’s ebook store. Borders owns 20% of Kobo, Inc. so it’s no wonder they have a partnership (it’s who you know, you know?).
Can Kobo ebooks be read on a nook?
Yes, because the nook supports ePub and Adobe Digital Editions, Kobo ebooks can be read on a nook. Unsure if your ereader is supported by Kobo? Find the full list here along with instructions on how to read an ebook on an ereader other than a Kobo.
Reviewing Barnes and Noble’s Business Strategy through the Lens of the Nook
I wrote an article in October 2009 entitled Barnes and Noble VS. The Nook which predicted that Barnes and Noble would go the way of Amazon.com from a brick-and-mortar store to a company-as-a-website. This was before the nook was officially released in early December 2010 and before it became available in Best Buy stores in April 2010.
On July 31, 2010 Barnes and Noble announced they were reducing CD-selling space in their book stores in order to create 1000 square foot “nook lounges” for their in-store ebook customers, but then on Wednesday, August 4, 2010 Barnes and Noble announced that it was looking for someone to buy their company.
Barnes and Noble shares have fallen by more than half since April 2010, and other companies like Circuit City facing significant structural changes have made similar announcements in the past. Circuit City ended up declaring bankruptcy and eventually going bankrupt, but their sister-company CircuitCity.com remains alive. Might the same fate come to Barnes and Noble as it transitions? How has the nook played into this strategy? Did Barnes and Noble have to create the nook to stay in the game or was this their game? Answer in the comments below.
Barnes & Noble Nook for iPad App lets you Share Books and Much More
Barnes and Noble has officially introduced their iPad app called “Nook” that brings a ton of new functionality to using Apple’s iPad as an ereader. The app is available for free and offers lots of great reasons to choose it over other eReaders including ten free samples of current bestsellers, three free classics, and samples of any ebook.
One unique feature of Nook for iPad is the ability to share books with friends with the LendME feature with built in integration with your existing iPad contacts. Ebooks can only be lent once and for a period of no more than two weeks.
Nook for iPad also features adjustable font sizes (up to 10 different font sizes), multiple font types, swipe to turn pages (the nook ereader uses hardware buttons to turn the pages), background and text color options, and the ability to sync notes, bookmarks, and highlights.
A lot of the other features are similar to the features that exist on the actual nook ereader, which should make those who are used to using the nook comfortable with using the iPad, although I’m not sure there are many users who initially bought a nook only to purchase an iPad months later, but who knows. 
@_Deko on Twitter announced that @nooktalk via nooktalk.net allows people to lend/share eBooks on their forum. We checked it out and indeed there is a category called “The eBook Exchange” where users can list books they’d like to “trade” with other users of the nook.
As of date, users had multiple threads both offering e-books they have to lend as well as e-books they’d like to borrow. The most popular posts (by number of replies) were by the ones offering up books to share. Those who had the least replies (zero) were from users posting about a specific book.
According to Matthew Miller of ZDnet, the basics of the LendMe service is that you can lend supported books one time to one person for a period up to 14 days. You can loan multiple books to the same person, but each supported book is only able to be lent out by you once. This is a limitation placed on the books by publishers.
The books are available to the person who received the loaned book for free for up to 14 days and can be returned by the reader earlier if they finish in just a few days or something. To be clear, the owner cannot then lend that book out again to someone else, ever.
LendMe does not know or care whether or not the person you are lending to is a friend or someone you’ve met on a forum. The only requirements are the ones listed above, that it be a LendMe-capable book, and that the person be on your nook contact list. Simply add the person to your contact list and you will be able to loan the book to the other person, but as previously mentioned, you’ll only be able to lend it once. If anyone knows of any exceptions to this, please post them in the comments below.
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