Seattle, Washington  - Online retailer Amazon. com Inc is to introduce an updated version of its Kindle e-book reader outside the United States.

Kindle can now be bought in more than 100 countries worldwide, Amazon boss Jeff Bezos told German Press Agency dpa on Tuesday. However, the books on offer for download were limited to English-language editions.

"However, it is our vision to some day be able to deliver every book in every language," Bezos said.

The international Kindle version can be pre-ordered for delivery later this month for 279 dollars, using the US portal of Amazon. com.

Amazon also lowered the price for the US version of the Kindle for a second time since July, dropping prices from 299 dollars to 259 dollars.

Millions of clients all over the world read English-language books, Bezos said.

Amazon struck a general agreement with US telecoms giant AT&T and its international roaming partners, allowing users to download a book in less that 1 minute if an UMTS phone network is available.

Downloaded versions available on Kindle tend to be cheaper than printed versions. Titles from the New York Times' bestseller list are available for around 9.99 dollars, which is about half the price of a corresponding hardcover edition.

In the US, e-books have only a small, but growing, share in the book market. According to Amazon. com, The Lost Symbol, the latest bestseller by Dan Brown, outsold the hardcover edition.

If books were on sale both printed and in digital versions, on average one e-book was sold for every two printed books, Bezos said.

According to media reports, Amazon. com sold about 800,000 e-book readers this year, figures which Bezos declined to confirm.

On the international market, the company's main competitors are e-book readers launched by Japanese electronics giant Sony Corp and iRex Technologies, a spin-off of Royal Philips Electronics. (dpa)