Bangalore, Dec. 11: Online retailer Flipkart today shut down its e-book store, three years after the launch.

In a statement issued here, the company said the service did not work since Indians still preferred physical books.

"The Indian book market is overwhelmingly dominated by physical books and this is a market that is growing at a fast clip," the company said.

Flipkart will continue to sell physical copies through its web portal and mobile app.

Explaining why it had decided to drop out of the e-book space, the company said: "In its overall strategy for books, Flipkart does not see e-books as a strategic fit and hence the decision of transitioning the e-books service to Kobo."

All purchases made so far through Flipkart would stay intact but any revision or updates in the e-book digital files purchased on Flipkart would now be seamlessly done through Kobo. Kobo - an anagram for book - is a Toronto-based company that markets an e-reader.

Flipkart said it would send out a personalised transfer link through an email on December 17 to its existing e-book customers. When customers click on the link, it will transfer the entire library of e-books from Flipkart to Kobo.

"We will refund you for those purchased titles from your library, that are not available on Kobo. Refunds will be made out on December 17 to your Flipkart account," the company said.

The company said the e-books app could be accessed even after the transition to Kobo till February 18 next year.

While no one from the company was available for comment on record, a source at the Bangalore-based firm said the move was prompted by "the need to streamline our business".

The staff member, who cannot be named since he is not authorised to speak to the media, said Flipkart was focusing more on its core business of books, consumer durables and apparel.

The Indian retailer launched its e-books store in 2012 and within a year, rolled out its mobile apps for Android iOS and Windows Phones platforms that enabled buyers to download books through the apps.

Flipkart was launched in 2007 as an online bookstore that offered physical copies at discounted prices. It later expanded its range by adding computers, mobile handsets, household items and apparel.

Flipkart had launched its service with 70,000 titles in the e-books category that later swelled to 3 lakh.

For most publishers, e-book sales range between 2 and 5 per cent.

But several industry reports had projected that e-book sales would constitute 25 per cent of the overall book sales in India - a fact that Flipkart had itself highlighted last year when talking about the prospects for its e-books business.

E-book sales in the country may be slow but not everybody is disenchanted about the prospects for this business.

Earlier this year, Netscribes came out with a study that projected the size of the e-books market in the country at Rs 2,200 crore by 2018 - a compounded annual growth rate of 67 per cent from Rs 100 crore in 2013.

The big daddy of the e-books business in India is Amazon, which markets the Kindle on which e-books are read.

In September, Amazon launched a subscription service, Kindle Unlimited. At Rs 199 per month, the service allows access to the entire catalogue from all devices and not just Kindle.

The service is now available for users of Apple, Android and Windows Phone mobile devices. Earlier, Amazon e-books were available only for users of its proprietary Kindle e-readers and tablets.

Bangalore-based documentary filmmaker Maya Jaideep said she did not even know that Flipkart had an e-book platform. "I never felt the need to try anything else (other than Amazon)."

Young lawyer Vibha Vasuki has been using the Kindle and buying books only from Amazon since her college days.

"Kindle allows cross-platform usability," she said about the device allowing users to access downloaded content from Android, iOS or Windows Phone platforms. "I don't think anyone who tried Amazon would switch to anything else," she said.

Web marketing professional Syed Zeeshan is among those who have entirely switched to e-books. But he prefers Amazon. "I tried Flipkart a few times. But I prefer reading on Kindle (Amazon product) as it somehow became a habit."

According to him, Flipkart was a tad cheaper than Amazon. "But sometimes, a few rupees do not really matter if the product is good. The other problem with Flipkart was bugs. The e-book files often downloaded with some bugs that slowed down the system."

But a Calcutta-based journalist, who owns a Kindle, said he had downloaded a free e-book reader from Flipkart while purchasing an e-book from the web portal. It allowed customers to read books on their mobiles.

He found the Flipkart e-book reader convenient to use as it gave the real feel of turning the pages of a book. It also provided the facility of book-marking and making notes and highlights.

"I don't know if Flipkart will provide support to its e-reader now. I have used it to read books downloaded from other websites as well," he said.

Flipkart had recently ended its deal with self-publishing website Smashwords. Independent writers who want to publish their works will now have to go directly to Smashwords site instead of Flipkart.

In May 2013, Flipkart had unplugged its online music service Flyte after just 15 months in the business. It was in direct competition with market-leader Apple's iTunes, one of the best in the digital music business.

Last year, Flipkart switched off its custom-built payment gateway PayZippy, also launched in 2013.