Google will provide digital download of books alongside its book search product soon. This step of Google will compete against Amazon and Apple in the emerging digital book marketplace. After a panel discussion with Google’s manager for strategic-partner development, Chris Palma, at the Book Industry Study Group in New York, the announcement came in the form of a comment. “The new e-book store will be called Google Editions and should launch in late June or July,” said by Wall Street Journal, who was there at the event.

Google users are allowed to buy digital copies of books they discover through its book-search service through this new service. Third-parties will be allowed to sell Google Editions on their own sites and “keep the bulk of the revenue by Google”. The Internet giant allows users to access books from a wider range of devices and hopes to differentiate it from competitors.

Details about its pricing and which publishers are expected to participate will be released by Google soon. For free in the ePub format, public-domain books have been offered by the company. To distribute out-of-print copyright-protected books, Google is still trying to close a controversial settlement. Aim of Google is to differentiate itself from other digital book vendors “by allowing users to access books from a broad range of websites using a broad array of devices”. This feature is dissimilar with Apple’s iBooks. Apple’s iBooks are only available through the iPad and the iPhone.

Video of Google to launch digital bookstore from youtube: