Amazon introduced four new Kindle tablets Thursday at a news event in California. The Post’s Hayley Tsukayama reports :
Amazon sent a shot across Apple’s bow Thursday with the introduction of a 4G tablet that’s hundreds of dollars cheaper than the iPad.
Actually, the company introduced four tablets and a new e-reader: the light-up Kindle Paperwhite e-ink reader, a new version of the Kindle Fire and three versions of an enhanced tablet called the Kindle Fire HD.
The announcement included a 4G LTE-enabled, 8.9-inch, 32GB tablet for $599, which Amazon compared directly with the equivalent iPad in a chart onstage, according to ABC News. A 32GB iPad with a 4G connection costs $729.
There are key differences between the two tablets, of course. The iPad is bigger with a 9.7-inch screen and comes with iCloud storage and a larger variety of applications than the Kindle Fire HD. And, while Amazon is offering a $50 per year data plan for its tablet, the plan comes with just 250 MB of data. Yes, it costs more to have the same amount of data on the iPad (AT&T’s plan is $14.99 per month for the same amount), but Amazon customers won’t be able to do much on the cellular network besides some light e-mail and Web surfing.
Even with those limitations, however, Amazon has pulled off a pricing coup that chief executive Jeff Bezos touted in his remarks to the crowd.
He said that hardware should be simply one part of the services that companies offer to their consumers. “We want to make money when people use our devices, not when they buy our devices,” Bezos told the crowd in California, according to a report from Ars Technica.
So, what does Amazon’s Kindle Fire HD line mean for Apple? Bloomberg reports :
Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos, who unveiled the devices in Santa Monica, California, is retooling the tablets as consumers face a widening array of choices, including new entries from Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp. At stake is a piece of a market that may reach $66.4 billion this year, according to research firm DisplaySearch.
Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos, who unveiled the devices in Santa Monica, California, is retooling the tablets as consumers face a widening array of choices, including new entries from Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp. At stake is a piece of a market that may reach $66.4 billion this year, according to research firm DisplaySearch.
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