NEW YORK - Apple Inc took a big jump into the
digital textbooks market with the launch of its iBooks 2 software on
Thursday, aiming to revitalize the U.S. education market and quicken the
adoption of its market-leading iPad in that sector.
The giant consumer electronics company has been working on digital
textbooks with publishers Pearson PLC, McGraw-Hill Cos Inc and Houghton
Mifflin Harcourt, a trio responsible for 90 percent of textbooks sold in
the United States.
The move pits the maker of
the iPod and iPhone against Amazon.com Inc and other content and device
makers that have made inroads into the estimated $8 billion market with
their electronic textbook offerings.
It could
also see Apple shake up the traditional textbook market significantly,
changing the emphasis from content to hardware; but publishers said
working would be a great opportunity to revive and expand the market.
"I give such incredible marks to Steve Jobs and Apple for having this
vision and pushing it through the iPad," said Terry McGraw, chief
executive of McGraw-Hill. He said he had been talking to Apple's founder
Jobs and his team since last June about recreating textbooks as
applications. Jobs died in October.
He said
having textbooks on iPads will open up the market beyond high school and
university students to everyday consumers. "I think without a doubt
this will open up a learning agency for anybody and anywhere."
The early plan is to enable students to buy their books directly
through Apple rather than through their school districts. The books in
the pilot launch are priced at $14.99 each on the iPad, with a range of
interactive features.
McGraw confirmed that
Apple would take a cut of each sale, believed to be its standard amount
of some 30 percent. He said he was "very relaxed" about having to share
his profits with Apple, as printing and distributing textbooks accounts
for about 25 percent of their cover prices.
Apple also unveiled iBooks Author, a new free application available on
the Mac App Store which enables anyone to create a book. It also
re-introduced its iTunes U service as a standalone app, with up to 100
complete university online courses from colleges including Yale and
Duke.
At an event at New York's Guggenheim Museum, Apple marketing chief Phil Schiller and Apple Internet chief Eddy Cue introduced tools to craft digital textbooks and demonstrated how authors and even teachers can create books for students.
The "value of the app is directly proportional to students having
iPads," said Michael Gartenberg, an analyst with industry research firm
Gartner.
Reinventing the textbook
Apple's Schiller said it is time to reinvent the textbook, adding that 1.5 million iPads are in use now in education.
"It's hard not to see that the textbook is not always the ideal learning tool," he said. "It's a bit cumbersome."
IBooks 2 will be available as a free app on the iPad, starting
Thursday. High school textbooks will be priced at $14.99 or less,
Schiller said.
"You'll see textbooks for every subject for every level," he added.
At the event, the first since the passing of Jobs, Schiller said
teachers need help and Apple is trying to figure out how it can do its
part.
"In general, education is in the dark ages," he said, adding that education has challenges that are "pretty profound."
Cue told Reuters that young students would be quick to adopt the iBooks
2 technology, which is based on its iPad. But he declined to comment on
whether Apple would introduce a cheaper iPads to make the iBooks
software available to poorer students.
"Our
iPads are very affordable; they start at $499. It's an amazing product
with all the capabilities that it brings; that's what we've got and we
feel very good about that," said Cue.
Other
media and technology companies have eyed the U.S. education market as
ripe for some sort of upheaval. Rupert Murdoch's News Corp launched an
education business two years ago and hired former New York City
Education Chancellor Joel Klein to lead it.
According to Jobs' biography by Walter Isaacson,
Murdoch met with Jobs last year and discussed the possibility of
Apple's entrance into a market Jobs estimated at $8 billion a year and
believed was ripe for disruption.
Shares in Apple dipped 10 cents to $429.01 on the Nasdaq in afternoon trade. — Reuters
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