Amazon.com Inc, maker of the Kindle e-book reader, is expected to unveil a tablet powered by Google Inc’s Android operating system at an event in New York this week according to numerous press reports.
The Seattle-based online retail giant is holding a press conference in the Big Apple today, but has enigmatically declined to say what it was about.
According to the tech blog TechCrunch, the Amazon device will be called the “Kindle Fire” and will feature a seven-inch (17.78cm) screen, smaller than Apple Inc’s iPad’s 9.7-inch display.
It will ship in the second week of November, TechCrunch said.
Technology analysts are predicting that an Amazon tablet could pose the most serious challenge yet to Apple’s dominance of the fast-growing tablet market.
“More than any other recent tablet introduction, Amazon’s entry is set to shake the still--solidifying market to its very core,” independent technology analyst Carmi Levy said. “Unlike hardware manufacturers who lack the pockets and the resolve to slug it out with Apple in a protracted war over market share, Amazon has both the resources and the will to stay in the game as long as it needs to.”
Forrester Research analyst Sarah Rotman Epps, in a recent blog post, said Amazon taking on Apple is a “bit like David taking on Goliath.”
However, Rotman Epps said Amazon’s “willingness to sell hardware at a loss, combined with the strength of its brand, content, cloud infrastructure and commerce assets, makes it the only credible iPad competitor in the market.”
According to technology research firm Gartner, the iPad will account for 68.7 percent of the 69.7 million tablets sold this year and will remain the top--selling device during the next few years.
While Gartner said Android-powered tablets will see their market share rise from 14.2 percent last year to 19.9 percent this year, most of Apple’s tablet rivals are struggling.
Samsung Electronics Co is mired in global legal battles with Apple over patent infringement claims, while BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd shipped only 200,000 PlayBooks last quarter, when Apple sold 9.25 million iPads.
Levy and other analysts said they expect Amazon to significantly undercut Apple on price. Apple’s cheapest iPad sells for US$499, but Levy said an Amazon tablet could start at about US$250.
“Since Amazon is in the business of moving content and not hardware, I expect its tablet to be very aggressively priced,” he said. “An artificially low price point would also put pressure on Apple — something no competitor has been able to do thus far.”
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
CROSS-STRAIT TENSIONS: The US company could switch orders from TSMC to alternative suppliers, but that would lower chip quality, CEO Jensen Huang said Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳), whose products have become the hottest commodity in the technology world, on Wednesday said that the scramble for a limited amount of supply has frustrated some customers and raised tensions. “The demand on it is so great, and everyone wants to be first and everyone wants to be most,” he told the audience at a Goldman Sachs Group Inc technology conference in San Francisco. “We probably have more emotional customers today. Deservedly so. It’s tense. We’re trying to do the best we can.” Huang’s company is experiencing strong demand for its latest generation of chips, called
GLOBAL ECONOMY: Policymakers have a choice of a small 25 basis-point cut or a bold cut of 50 basis points, which would help the labor market, but might reignite inflation The US Federal Reserve is gearing up to announce its first interest rate cut in more than four years on Wednesday, with policymakers expected to debate how big a move to make less than two months before the US presidential election. Senior officials at the US central bank including Fed Chairman Jerome Powell have in recent weeks indicated that a rate cut is coming this month, as inflation eases toward the bank’s long-term target of two percent, and the labor market continues to cool. The Fed, which has a dual mandate from the US Congress to act independently to ensure
RSS