The Kindle Touch is apparently ready for extinction as Amazon is focusing on its new illuminated Kindle Paperwhite e-reader.

As the Kindle Paperwhite has recently appeared in Europe as well, Amazon has rather quietly decided that it is time to discontinue its Kindle Touch e-reader. Of course, this is not a big deal since the Kindle Paperwhite has the same price as the Kindle Touch at US $119 for WiFi-only and US $179 for WiFi+3G versions.

In a response to Pocket-lint.com inquiry, Amazon.co.uk noted that Kindle Touch is still available for purchase through their high street retail partners and just no longer available at Amazon's store. The same thing is at Amazon.com U.S. store.

Other alternatives now include the US $69 Kindle and US $139 Kindle Keyboard 3G. Of course, this leaves a big gap between the cheapest US $69 Kindle and US $109 Kindle Paperwhite, so the better question is why Amazon did not simply drop the price of its Kindle Touch, or is something else going to fill that gap?

You can check out the original Amazon.co.uk statement on Pocket-lint.com.