Google chairman Eric Schmidt recently told an Italian newspaper that Google would be releasing a tablet “of the highest quality.” This was in December, and Schmidt said that it would be coming within the next six months. Several weeks later, alleged supply chain sources said that the tablet would be more of a Kindle Fire rival than a threat to the iPad.
Google tablet will be 7-inch ‘entertainment device’ much smaller than 9.7-inch iPad 2
Will launch in March or April
Android touchscreen will cost $200
Comes after Google creates or updates web stores for books, music and films
The sources in Google’s supply chain believe that Google will launch the own-brand tablet PC in March or April, according to a report in Digitimes.
It will reportedly feature a seven-inch panel, run Google’s Android – unsurprisingly – and will retail at less than $200, the same price as Kindle Fire.
That would pitch the gadget squarely at the market for Amazon’s Kindle Fire – ie it would be a large entertainment device, not a ‘laptop replacement’ such as Apple’s 9.7-inch iPad or Samsung’s 10.1-inch Galaxy Tab.
Google has recently made moves into selling music, films and books, so such a move would make sense.
Digitimes has a reasonable track record for spot-on leaks, but is given to a certain amount of speculation – the site has written 50 articles on iPad 3 alone, according to reports.
‘Sources from Google’s upstream supply chain believe that Google, instead of Apple, may actually be targeting Amazon’s 7-inch Kindle Fire as its major competitor,’ says Digitimes.
Questions regarding the Tablet are:
Will a Google tablet arrive mid 2012?
Who will build the new Google tablet?
Google Nexus tablet?
