“Amazon.com Inc, which revolutionized reading with its Kindle e-reader, is expected to unveil a tablet computer this week that analysts say will seriously challenge Apple’s market dominating iPad,” Dhanya Skariachan, Phil Wahba and Alistair Barr report for Reuters. “Amazon on Friday invited media to a press conference to be held in New York on Wednesday, declining to provide further details.”
“But analysts were confident that the world’s largest Internet retailer will introduce its long-awaited tablet computer this year to expand in mobile commerce and sell more digital goods and services,” Skariachan, Wahba and Barr report. “‘Wednesday is tablet day,’ BGC partners analyst Colin Gillis told Reuters. ‘The real issue here is that, you know, it is likely going to be good for consumers; is this going to be good for shareholders?’ Gillis said. He wondered whether Amazon would price the tablet below those of rivals — and thereby do little to boost margins.”
Skariachan, Wahba and Barr report, “It will be a 7 inch device with a full color, touch screen, run on Google’s Android software and cost $250, the blog said, well below the price of the least expensive iPad.”
MacDailyNews Take: With a screen just 45% of iPad’s size and dependent upon a half-baked, highly-fragmented, insecure OS that’s subject to dozens of patent infringement cases around the world and suffering from tremendous tablet AppLack™, it ought to be even cheaper.
Skariachan, Wahba and Barr report, “Robert Baird & Co analyst Colin Sebastian said in a note last month than an Amazon tablet would be a ‘game-changer.’ Sebastian forecast the device could sell 3 million units in its first year. The tablet could pose a major threat to Apple because of the Kindle’s popularity and the movie and music services Amazon sells.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: 3 million in a year is a “major threat” on which planets, exactly? The planet “Pump AMZN” or the planet “Short AAPL” or both? Apple currently sells over 3 million iPads every 30 days. That number will only increase. Any analyst who thinks a 7-inch color Kindle is a “serious challenge” to Apple’s iPad does’t even remotely understand the marketplace they claim to cover. Any analyst who types it or says it is a fool.
Related articles:
Analysts claim Amazon’s tablet will be serious challenge to Apple’s iPad – September 26, 2011
Amazon to hold media event on September 28th – September 23, 2011
Vendors cast doubts on success of 7-inch Amazon tablet, Android Ice Cream Sandwich vs. iPad – September 22, 2011
Ha! Right!
I will invent a new automobile and I will call it the Edsel. I promise you I will sell millions. Don’t worry about seeing any of my sales figures because they will be stellar and you won’t need to see any data.
The Edsel will perform better than anything currently marketed as an automobile. It’s coming soon and it will dominate the industry. And at a price no one can beat.
I’ll be taking orders very soon!
ah…put me down for six o’those
Couldn’t have said it better.
hey, if that Edsel has a built-in, dash-mounted BetaMax..put me down for three of ’em.
Oooo Yeah!! Don’t forget the 8-Track playa either! 😉
But we’ve seen actual 8-Tracks in action. I hear the future MS KinTrack (with PlaysForSure™) will be much better.
I’d rather have one of these:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cord_Automobile
Yeah, a threat just like Amazon’s digital music store is a threat to iTunes.
Basically they mean, Amazon’s new tablet is a serious threat to all non-Apple tablets… They may very well pull the rug out from every other Android based tablet, but won’t dent the sales of iPads.
It seems like, with Apple’s ‘competition,’ the most amazing thing they ever saw is a mock-up, or a promise of a supposed iPad-, iPhone-, Mac-, or iOS-killer, just like the new Intel “Visibly Smart” TV ad I saw yesterday. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0R3bxvaIt4
“What’s the most amazing thing you ever saw? Was it something big? Or something small? Something old or something new? Or maybe, just maybe, it was something you haven’t seen yet.”
Funny, my son pointed it out to me after the spot ran, “The most amazing thing you ever saw is something you haven’t seen yet?!?!?!?!” he says. I just love vaporware!!
No it’s a serious challenge for Android tablets. It’ll be running a forked version of Android so won’t have Google’s blessing or store but will have Amazon’s own store built in. Amazon will be able to knock these out at cost or a very slim margin because the strategy is to make it up on content sales and drive sales to Amazon for other physical items. It will take out the cheap Android tablets at the knees but Apple will still rule the high end.
The great white hope of Applehaters who wish Amazon would KO Apple overnight.
“Robert Baird & Co analyst Colin Sebastian said in a note last month than an Amazon tablet would be a ‘game-changer.’”
Yeah. If the game is “Race to the Bottom.”
Analyst reports AAPL iPad 2 orders cut by 25%. Hmmmmmmm
Sure that’s great. And it will. But not because of reading. it will be a threat because Android tablets suck ass.
No one wants to read on a color LCD tablet. This thing will be all about media consumption, and that’s great. But if you think the ‘Kindle’ owners are going to ‘upgrade’ to this, you’re high and drunk.
“Robert Baird & Co analyst Colin Sebastian said in a note last month than an Amazon tablet would be a ‘game-changer.’
Just to be clear, this guy does NOT cover Apple, but presumably covers Amazon. So his motivation is clear, to pump up Amazon’s ridiculous stock price, which is running at 98, though their net profit margin is less than 2%. Even WalMart’s profit margin is higher, and they only get a PE of 11. Eventually, the bloom will come off the Amazonian rose, and investors will realize they’ve been had, as Amazon will never be able to increase their margins enough to justify their ridiculous price multiple. Amazon’s been around long enough for people to see that their business is built around avoiding States’ sales taxes, and that won’t last forever as States get more desperate for ways to improve their budgets.
“Analysts” are shills for the people they get advance information from.
Any serious challenge to Apple’s iPad is going to have to challenge the whole ecosystem…Fat Chance.
Doesn’t this tablet already exist? But it’s called something slightly different by a competitor of the kindle. The Nook Color. Now if I’m not mistaken the Nook Color hasn’t touched the iPad. I’m not worried at all.
I quite like the Kindle. An Amazon tablet would sell well and no doubt establish the first non-Apple ecosystem in the tablet market, but it’s a bit of a jump from that to saying it will “seriously challenge” the iPad. It would have to improve quite a bit before it reaches that level.
I do not believe that Amazon is a threat to Apple but I do believe they will sell well partly on upgrades from their existing users and they will be a threat to all the other vendors trying to sell tablets.
Any Amazon color tablet is a complement to the iPad, not competition, as there isn’t any. Quite different products. We own Kindles and iPads. I quite like Amazons products but they are not really competitors since Ammazon tablets don’t do as much. If you have an iPad you might quite like a color Kindle too. Nothing here, move along.