Google announces new tablet, takes on iPad, Amazon’s Fire

TOI

New Delhi, 27 June 2012: Google today announced its own tablet at Google I/O, the company’s annual event for developers. TOI had reported on June 26 that Google would finally enter the tablet market.

 

However, it seems that instead of competing with Apple’s iPad, which has the highest market share in the tablet market, Google is aiming to take down Amazon’s Kindle Fire, a 7-inch tablet that runs on Android but doesn’t use several Google services like other Android devices do.

 

The tablet, named Nexus 7, has a 7-inch screen with a resolution of 1280x800 pixels. It is powered by a 1.3Ghz Tegra 3 processor and has 1GB RAM.

 

The tablet runs on Jelly Bean, the latest version of Android operating software which was also announced at the I/O event. Nexus 7 is made by Asus. It has a 4,325mAh battery.

 

Nexus 7 will cost $199 in the US. Though at the moment there is no information on the availability of the tablet in India.

 

While Android tablets are selling in the market for the last one year, they have failed find buyers and dent the iPad market. Also, Amazon launched Kindle Fire last year and sold more tablets in a few months than what Google’s hardware partners had managed in a year. The irony is that Fire is powered by Android, Google’s operating software, but Amazon has heavily modified it. This means Fire doesn’t come with the Google services pre-installed. This affects Google’s ability to make money from Fire even though it uses Android.

 

"Google believes it has given its partners ample time to innovate and compete but they have been unsuccessful versus the iPad," said Patrick Moorhead, president at Moor Insights & Strategy, firm that advices several computer hardware companies.

 

With its new tablet, Google hopes to provide a clear direction to its hardware partners the way it does in the case of smartphones with Nexus devices. It also hopes that by entering the fray, it can motivate developers to write more tablet-specific apps for Android.