Beginning today Barnes & Noble’s Nook Media subsidiary will add the Google Play content library to its Nook HD and HD+ devices as well as offering Google online services as part of the Nook platform. In addition to adding more than 700,000 Android apps, games, music and other digital content, Nook devices will now offer access to Google’s YouTube, Google Search and Gmail services as well as Google’s Chrome Web Browser.
Nook Media will release a software update today via wi-fi that will update the software for U.S. and for U.K. consumers for all 7-inch Nook HD and 9-inch Nook HD+ devices. Nook devices run a customized version of Ice Cream Sandwich, the Android 4.0 operating system, and previously offered consumers a more limited catalog of apps optimized for the Nook’s customized OS. But in light of the upgraded Nook device’s slow sales over the last holiday season, it seemed inevitable that Nook Media would open up the devices to a richer catalog of Android digital content.
William Lynch, CEO of Barnes & Noble, said “By adding Google Play to Nook HD and Nook HD+, we are offering our customers even more great entertainment on our award-winning tablets.”
