It’s been a long time coming – and strictly speaking it’s not quite here yet – but it looks as if the Amazon Kindle reader is about to get some serious competition. Sony has just announced the launch of its latest e-book reader – the “Daily Edition” – and it looks as if it will give the Kindle a run for its money.

Sony say it will be on sale before the end of the year – which probably means it will be out in time for the Christmas gift giving season. The price has been set at 9. That’s 0 more than the Kindle 2 and less than the DX.

The price isn’t all that Sony have pitched between the Kindle 2 and the DX. Readers can view a similar number of lines of text to a paperback book on the seven inch wide screen. The reader beats both of the Kindles by including touch screen technology.

Wireless connectivity is provided – but only to the Sony bookstore. This will be provided by AT&T which may make it easier for Sony to launch the reader in Europe (no date for this has been announced as yet). Amazon’s (somewhat half-hearted) attempts to set up a European connection system similar to their US 3G “Whispernet” system have met with little success to date.

It appears that Sony has a very competitive offering here. On the face of it, the Daily Edition looks to be technically superior to the Kindle in certain areas. Of course, the technical aspects of the readers are not the only consideration. Amazon’s vast, and ever growing, library of available titles is a big plus point for them. However, Sony have a tie-up with Google which lets their users access Google’s public domain library and the Daily Edition reader will also allow users to access their local library’s collection of e-books.

There are plenty of other new readers planned for launch in the near future by other competitors – including Apple. Competition in the developing e-book reader market is growing rapidly. That’s good news for consumers as prices of both the readers and the e-books for them will naturally reduce.