An Amazon Smartphone could be the biggest loss leader of all
Following up on reports from the fourth quarter of 2011, Bloomberg on Friday cited anonymous sources that said Amazon is working on its own Smartphone in conjunction with noted Chinese device manufacturer Foxconn International Holdings. Additionally, the report pointed out that Amazon is also on the market to buy more wireless patents, highlighted by the fact that the company recently hired a new general manager for patent acquisitions.
Contemporaneously with the Bloomberg report, approximately a dozen new job listings at Amazon popped up today for mobile software engineers that can support "existing Amazon technologies and [build] support for next-generation technologies."
Meet Google Nexus 7, Kindle Killer
I told you so, in April. Contrary to pundits at the time viewing Google's tablet as an iPad competitor, I saw something else: Google isn't gunning for Apple but Amazon. After getting my hands on the tablet this evening, and comparing the experience using my wife's Kindle Fire, there is no doubt. Google will probably save Android from Amazon, but the end cost may be greater gains for iPad.
By just about every measure -- the exception being buying tens of thousands of retail goods -- using Nexus 7 feels like Kindle Fire, only better in every way. Significantly, the experience is different from using Google Nexus smartphones or other Android tablets. That's because Google Play is so visible. I can't say if that's a function of Android 4.1 Jellybean or how Google has set up the tablet. But content pushes to the forefront, like Kindle Fire, and much of it is similar.
NOW would you buy a Google Nexus tablet?
Google I/O starts tomorrow, and if rumors are right -- and I believe them -- developers get a big peak at the 7-inch Nexus tablet. About a month ago, I asked how much would you pay for one. Now with more details available, I ask if you will buy the Google device.
The Nexus tablet, manufactured by Asus, features a 7-inch IPS LCD display with 1280 x 800 resolution; 1.3 GHz quad-core Tegra 3 processor, 1GB RAM; 1.2-megapixel front-facing camera; near field communications; and Android 4.1 "Jellybean". There are two capacities, 8GB and 16GB, selling for $199 and $249, respectively. This information comes from a leaked training manual that Gizmodo Australia obtained. The big differentiator is price. As I explained in April, "Google isn't trying to save Android tablets but kill Kindle Fire".
Nexus 7 tablet rumors all point at Amazon's growing Android dominance
The existence of a 7-inch Google-branded Android tablet has been rumored for a couple of months, and Asus has proudly taken credit for manufacturing the device. Still, the specifics have not be officially laid out, so we have to rely on unnamed sources and ambiguous evidence for the next few days until Google I/O begins.
Reportedly, some "training materials" uncovered by Gizmodo Australia related to a tablet known as the "Nexus 7" provide some confirmation to prior rumors of an Asus-made Google Tablet, similar to the MeMO 370T that was debuted by Asus earlier this year.
Would US consumers choose iPad mini over Kindle Fire?
Rarely does a ChangeWave consumer buying survey offer so many intriguing topic possibilities. Interest in Kindle Fire has collapsed, only 7 percent of respondents plan to purchase a new tablet within 90 days, those buying overwhelmingly choose iPad, but interest in a smaller Apple tablet is fairly modest.
Buying intention surveys are often misleading. What people would like to do often isn't what they will when time comes to pay up. With that caveat, the survey -- 2,893 consumers last month -- bodes ill for Kindle Fire or prospective iPad mini. In November, 22 percent of respondents said they would buy Kindle Fire, but only 8 percent in May. Meanwhile a mere 3 percent of respondents would very likely buy iPad mini.
Instapaper finally lets Android users save sites for offline viewing
Instapaper, the popular iOS application that lets users save web pages for offline reading, was released for Android on Monday, and can now be downloaded in Google Play.
Instapaper's creator Marco Arment released the app exclusively for iOS, and showed a public preference for the platform, hence earning him the label of "Apple Fanboy" from much of the platform-partisan Web. But due to the undeniable success of Android tablets such as Amazon's Kindle Fire and Barnes and Noble's Nook, Arment and Android app makers Mobelux have ported Instapaper to Android.
Kindle Fire sales are still hot
Wow, what a swirl of good-news/bad-news last week for the media tablets aimed at the ereader market. As it turns out, the roller-coaster ride continues this week.
comScore reported that the Kindle Fire from Amazon generated far more Internet activity in February than any other Android media tablet. Then a few days later, Microsoft dumped $300 million into a Barnes & Noble ebook venture, a move spurred in part by the success of the bookseller’s media tablet, the Nook Tablet.
New iPad extinguishes Kindle Fire
Yesterday, colleague Ed Oswald gave four very good reasons why Target is dumping Amazon ereaders and tablets. For Kindle Fire, perhaps there is another: It's not selling. Today, IDC reports that Amazon tablet shipments collapsed during first quarter, all while iPad lapped them up.
"Apple reasserted its dominance in the market this quarter, driving huge shipment totals at a time when all but a few Android vendors saw their numbers drop precipitously after posting big gains during the holiday buying season" said Tom Mainelli, IDC research director. Apple's media tablet share rose to 68 percent from 54.7 percent during fourth quarter. Kindle Fire's shipments collapsed -- from 4.7 million to around 700,000 quarter on quarter. Amazon's share dropped from 16.8 percent to 4 percent, placing it third to Samsung.
Why are Amazon Kindles vanishing from Target?
Target confirmed on Wednesday earlier reports that it is discontinuing sales of Amazon products, most notably the Kindle, starting in Spring 2012. First reported by The Verge overnight Wednesday, the move is a hit to Kindle's retail store strategy overall and effectively ends a long-term partnership between the two companies.
Amazon powered Target's website up until last year, and Target was the first to carry the Kindle at retail back in June 2010. The Kindle Fire was Target's best selling tablet on Black Friday last year, but that didn't stop the retailer from kicking Amazon to the curb.
Kindle Fire, Nook Tablet are better by design
The best-designed Android tablets you can buy today aren’t the sleekest or the sexiest. They’re not the most powerful. And they don’t boast the largest or brightest displays. What they do have, however, are sales. The tablets? The Kindle Fire from Amazon and Barnes & Nobles’ Nook Tablet.
On a runway awash with thin, pretty models, it’s easy to overlook this pair of plain Janes. But don’t. They are two of the top three largest-selling Android tablets on the market. And their formula should serve as a model for how to succeed in this market if you’re a supplier that’s lacking a throng of breathless fanatics aching to snap up anything you sell.
Amazon fixed one of the most broken things about Kindle Fire, now it needs to fix the rest
For a platform that was built to handle text documents, Amazon Kindle's support for non Kindle-formatted files has been nothing short of atrocious.
Wirelessly sending documents to a Kindle required that they be emailed to a Kindle email address where they'd be converted and sent to the user's Kindle library; or they could be uploaded directly to Kindle e-readers or tablets via USB, but with spotty usability.
Google Drive: perfect for a 'Nexus Tablet' that takes on Kindle Fire
Google on Tuesday finally rolled out the long-rumored Google Drive cloud storage platform to compete with the likes of Dropbox, Skydrive, Box, iCloud, and all the rest.
But let's put cloud storage competition aside for a moment. When Google Drive was announced, I was immediately reminded of a recent quote in the New York Times:
Android rules the world?
Analysts love to make predictions. It's a no-risk gambit, because the forecasts are years away and nobody remembers if they're wrong. After thrice predicting that Windows Phone would beat out Apple's iOS by 2015, IDC has another for the same year: Android media tablet shipments will exceed iPad. By that reckoning, the firm predicts that Google's mobile OS will dominate the two major cloud-connected -- post-PC, if you insist -- device categories (the other being smartphones).
"As the sole vendor shipping iOS products, Apple will remain dominant in terms of worldwide vendor unit shipments", Tom Mainelli, IDC research director, says. "However, the sheer number of vendors shipping low-priced, Android-based tablets means that Google's OS will overtake Apple's in terms of worldwide market share by 2015. We expect iOS to remain the revenue market share leader through the end of our 2016 forecast period and beyond".
Kindle Fire will become Amazon's cash cow
Amazon's fourth quarter results missed targets, despite strong sales of the Kindle Fire. It is these users that will begin to pad the company's earnings, however, validating Amazon's strategy of selling Fire at a very low margin and then making up the profit through entertainment content sales.
Amazon saw its profits plummet, reporting net income of $177 million in the fourth quarter of 2011. This was down sharply from a year earlier, when the retailer reported income of $416 million. Revenue was up 35 percent however, to $17.4 billion.
One in four Americans own an e-book reader or tablet
That's a dramatic change from just a few months ago and, perhaps not coincidentally, before new Nooks and Kindles lowered price of entry for both categories. Between December and January, the number of Americans owning one of the devices rose to 29 percent from 18 percent. During the same time period, the number owning a tablet rose to 19 percent from 10 percent, which is the same rise for e-book readers.
Pew Internet released the data earlier today, based on surveys conducted in mid December and early January. "These findings are striking because they come after a period from mid-2011 into the autumn in which there was not much change in the ownership of tablets and e-book readers", according to the report. "However, as the holiday gift-giving season approached, the marketplace for both devices dramatically shifted". As recently as August 9 percent of Americans owned e-book readers and 10 percent tablets.