LOS ANGELES — Amazon.com is set to host a media event
on Wednesday morning in New York City, and the expectation is that the
world’s largest online retailer will be unveiling its long-rumored
Google Android-based Kindle tablet.
On Monday,
Amazon announced a beefing-up of its Amazon Prime service, with the
addition of more than 11,000 older movies and TV shows from Fox added to
the catalog.
The move is aimed at bolstering the
appeal of Amazon Prime, which offers online streaming of a catalog of TV
shows and movies to those who pay a the $79 annual fee, which also
gives subscribers free two-day shipping from Amazon.
Rumors
have also been circulating that with the release of the Amazon tablet,
the company could add an e-book rental service to Amazon Prime as well.
The
Amazon tablet, which is expected to carry the Kindle name used on the
Seattle-based company’s e-readers thus far, is rumored to cost about
$250 and feature a 7-inch touch screen, which would make it smaller and
about half the price of an entry-level Apple iPad, the current tablet
sales leader.
Of course, the Amazon tablet is
expected to be integrated with Amazon’s services, such as Amazon Prime
for shopping and streaming, Kindle for books, its MP3 store and Cloud
Player for music, and its Amazon Appstore for Android for apps.
The
licensing deal with News Corp.’s 20th Century Fox adds about 2,000
films and television shows to Amazon.com’s instant streaming service,
bringing to 11,000 the number of titles available through Amazon Prime.
Amazon
Prime members gain commercial-free access to such films as “Mrs.
Doubtfire,” “9 to 5” and “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” as well
as older television series including “24,” “The X-Files” and “Buffy the
Vampire Slayer.”
Consumers who are not Amazon
Prime members can rent or purchase movies and TV shows from Amazon
through its Instant Video stream service, at prices that start at $3.99
for new releases. Amazon offers more than 100,000 new and older titles
through its paid service.
The online retailer is
beefing up its catalog as it seeks to compete with Netflix, which just
secured the rights to stream DreamWorks Animation films. Amazon has
secured licensing deals with CBS, NBCUniversal, Sony and Warner Bros.
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