Towards the end of the year, when Amazon’s management team get together to consider the company’s performance in 2009, they will have good reason to feel content – but not smug. It’s been a very good year for the internet retail giant – and a lot of the credit must go to the Amazon Kindle reader.

Amazon released the Kindle 2 in February of 2009. It was widely regarded as a big step in the right direction. Amazon had clearly listened closely to customer feedback regarding the original Kindle, released in 2007. Wireless connectivity and the enormous library of Kindle books were retained and more rapid page turns, prolonged battery life and increased storage capacity were among the enhancements which were introduced.

Best selling author, Stephen King wrote a special Kindle book to mark the launch and the Kindle 2 rapidly became the “must have” gadget among a blaze of publicity.

Just a few months later, in June of 2009, Amazon unveiled the Kindle DX. This had a large screen and was intended to cater for readers of newspapers, magazines and academic textbooks. Somewhat surprisingly perhaps, it was the staid world of academic publishing that helped to gain the DX a lot of publicity.

The academic community was quick to realise the potential benefits the Kindle offered. Not only would it be very much faster to update textbooks but interactive education – pop quizzes and tests for example – would be possible. Academic bodies would not only save money as a result of using electronic books, but they would be more environmentally friendly also – an important factor for such establishments who have both budgets and environmental targets to meet nowadays.

As well as cementing partnerships with a number of universities and colleges, Amazon profited from a good deal publicity created by political bodies such as the New Democratic Leadership Council and Californian Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger – both of whom held forth on the educational benefits of e-book readers in general and the Amazon Kindle in particular.

However, as bright as things were looking for Amazon, there were indications that trouble was looming. Other manufacturers, having observed Amazon develop the e-book reader market, were now becoming aware of the enormous potential of this fledgling sector. An impressive list of competitors, including companies like Microsoft, Apple, Barnes and Noble and Sony, wanted their share – and they all had their own readers in development.

It’s a compliment to Amazon – albeit a backhanded one that practically every ebook reader under development which shows the slightest potential is immediately dubbed the “Kindle Killer”. The trouble is that, at this time, in spite of all the development work by the competition, Amazon is still the only game in town. Sony’s Daily Edition reader and the Nook from Barnes and Noble have both had their launch dates postponed. In fact, it looks increasingly likely that the most probable source of the long awaited Kindle Killer might be Amazon itself. The Kindle 4 is the most likely contender. Could we expect to see it sometime next year?