Barnes & Noble has been playing a rapid game of catch up to Amazon.com in the electronic book market, buying e-book seller Fictionwise and announcing plans for its own e-book store. Now, speculation is growing that the bookseller is planning a Kindle-like electronic reading device. TheStreet.com explores rumors that Barnes & Noble is working with an unidentified device maker and Sprint Nextel on a new reader.

Could that unidentied device maker be Plastic Logic, the Silicon Valley company that is developing a large-screen electronic reader? Fictionwise, now owned by Barnes & Noble, has a partnership with Plastic Logic, which is scheduled to release its reader in 2010.

Sprint Nextel already powers Kindle's wireless downloads, and is reportedly looking to provide wireless internet for other gadgets. TheStreet.com reports Barnes & Noble talked to Verizon about the project, but the discussions ended. Both Verizon and AT&T signaled their interest in e-books at the recent CTIA Wireless conference.

Barnes & Noble spokeswoman Mary Ellen Keating said the company had no comment. In a recent earnings conference call, however, Barnes & Noble CEO Stephen Riggio alluded to future plans in the e-book arena:

We plan to return to the business of offering customers digital content inclusive of e-books, newspapers and magazines.  We have a large number of assets in place to enable us to sell digital content, our e-commerce platform is solid and scalable, we operate a world-class in-house customer service center.  And a recent acquisition of Fictionwise has enhanced our ability to conduct digital transactions.
 
Of course, we understand investors are anxious to hear more specifics about our plans in this arena, we do have a wide range of initiatives in development but due to the highly strategic nature of this fast evolving market, we will announce each of them as they launch.

If Barnes & Noble can marry its book content to a proprietary reading device, it would make for an interesting matchup with Amazon.