Barnes and Noble Confirms Plans to Create E-Reader App for iPad

Posted 03/15/2010 at 4:45am | by Paul Lilly

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In what could end up being a major boost for Apple's iPad, Barnes and Noble confirmed in a recent blog post that it will soon offer an e-reader application for the upcoming tablet.

"Designed specifically for the iPad, our new B&N eReader will give our customers access to more than one million eBooks, magazines, and newspapers in the Barnes and Noble eBookstore, as well as the existing content in their Barnes and Noble digital library," B&N wrote.

The bookstore went on to say that the app will be released around the same time as the iPad's "expected availability," which is April 3rd.

What this ultimately means for Apple, B&N, and the tablet space in general remains to be seen, but the implications are potentially huge. The iPad -- and by extension, every other upcoming tablet -- will inevitably go toe-to-toe with the pretty popular e-book reader market, which might not have room for two separate device categories. Not to mention what effect this could have on publisher pricing if the iPad takes off the way Apple hopes it will.