Amazon to Announce iPad Rival Kindle Fire Tablet on Wednesday

[Maura]

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9to5 Mac has a nice round-up report about the various news stories currently doing the rounds regarding Amazon’s much-touted iPad rival tablet, which it says will be launched by Amazon at a media event this Wednesday in New York. According to TechCrunch, the new Android tablet will be called Kindle Fire (geddit?!), so as not to be confused with the Kindle e-reader devices; it will be made by Foxconn, the company that also makes the iPad, and will have a seven-inch colour touchscreen. It will not have an email client out of the box, but users will be able to download one of their choice, or use the installed browser for web-based mail programmes. Adding to the story, Peter Kafka at AllThingsD says that Amazon is also meanwhile busy forging many partnerships with Hollywood studios and magazine publishers for content including the likes of Fox, Hearst, Conde Nast and Meredith. And as 9to5 Mac notes, Amazon is already in the very favourable position of being able to sell both physical and digital products on its website, meaning that it could sell very competitive Kindle Fire bundles with subscriptions to magazines and apps, for example. Hopefully we should know a lot more once Amazon launches the device tomorrow as to whether or not the Kindle Fire could be the first genuine challenger to the iPad’s dominance of the tablet market. [/FONT]


Source: Book Burning? Amazon trying to set iPad ablaze Wednesday with the Kindle Fire tablet launch | 9to5Mac | Apple Intelligence

 

[jsh1120]

Should be an interesting device and a further fracturing of the "tablet" market and meaning of the term. The Android fans will hate it but that's not the market Amazon is aiming for. Assuming the expected price of about $250 is accurate, it will cut into some low end iPad sales, just as the iPad has impacted notebook sales. The iPad has been successful in large part by selling to people who were forced to "overbuy" computers when they didn't need more than a content consumption device and email client. Amazon is likely to do the same for customers who don't need the range of functionality provided by the iPad and other similar tablets.

 

[info]

Hmmmm... I believe Foxconn was also making at least one of the Samsung tablets as well as the iPad, now the Kindle tablet as well. It seems that this would somehow result in a conflict of interest. On the other hand, it also seems like a common practice.

 

[thewitt]

Think of Foxcon as a city, not a company. The size and scope are such that "Apple Foxcon" and "Amazon Foxcon" share nothing. They are even several kilometers apart on campus and have different employee badges.