Remember the chatter prior to last week, that Apple would announce an inexpensive iPhone? Well the rumor has returned — evolved into the “iPad mini.” According to one analyst, Apple is prepping the device for 2012 to combat Amazon’s $199 Kindle Fire.
The iPad mini, writes Ticonderoga Securities analyst Brian White, will be an iPad “priced in the mid-to-high $200 range.” White just returned from talking with suppliers in China and Taiwan. Like the previous inexpensive iPhone rumor, the iPad mini will precede “a much more powerful, feature rich standard-priced iPad 3″ in the second quarter of 2012,” the analyst claims.
The supposed iPad mini will target what White terms a “more price sensitive consumer segment,” i.e. those buyers considering purchasing Amazon’s $199 Kindle Fire. Although the iPad mini is not supposed to be smaller than the standard iPad (the Fire has a 7-inch screen rather than Apple’s 9.7-inch tablet display), it is unknown how the inexpensive iPad will keep costs down.
A low-cost iPad could catch fire in third-world nations, such as China, providing Apple another region to market its products, White said.
Perhaps Apple will follow Amazon’s lead and move features such as storage onto iCloud. The Cupertino, Calif. company already is known for keeping tight control on supplier costs. The cloud alternative could make the most sense as the tech giant prepares to roll out its new iOS 5 with many iCloud-based features.
It is unlikely Apple’s reported iPad mini will sport a smaller display. In 2010, late co-founder Steve Jobs derided rivals who launched tablets with 7-inch screens. The small touchpanels would require consumers to sand down their fingertips to accommodate the smaller targets, he said in his trademarked dismissive style.
Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.
54 responses to “Apple to Fire Back at Amazon with ‘iPad mini’ in 2012 [Rumor]”
Ipad mini = ipod touch :l
China is a “
third-world nation”? Really?
Yes, iTouch is the iPad mini, but everyone refuses to accept it.
Here’s my prediction: iPhone 5 is going to have a bigger screen right? Maybe, well, after Tim Cook announced that the iPod line is going to continue in it’s strength,
I think they’re going to release an iPod Touch 5, with a bigger, probably retina 4.3 inch screen. Amazon’s got a frickin’ small screen, no camera, no nothing. The iPod touch with a larger screen would easily combat the Kindle Fire’s lower-rez screen size.
Let’s just say it won’t be an iPad mini. That would imply small and the iPad won’t ever be small. Maybe the iPhone and the iPod touch will get bigger, but the iPad won’t get smaller.
No
Surely an iPad Lite would be better name than iPad Mini as it doesn’t connote a change/reduction in size???
Analysts are ALWAYS wrong. Apple doesn’t compete with others. It doesn’t make products to compete. It creates new classes for others to catch up to IT. Get it. Got it? Good.
No Way, that’s not Apple strategy, would you care about a $199 kindle when you have 98% of the tablet market and the Apple App/ecosystem behind you?
wow this old chestnut again , why would any one bye it. if you want an iPad mini it already exists “iPhone”
They already have an iPad mini. It’s called and iPad touch!
I’m sending this comment from my iPod mini, also known as an iPod Touch.
Um, no. Maybe a 16gb wifi iPad/2 for $199. Maybe.
iPad mini is a longshot, I agree with the other posters and say they need to make a larger iPod Touch. I would like to see a 5 or 6 inch screen, something that I wouldn’t necessarily take in my pocket everywhere (a la iPod) but something smaller than the iPad that I personally would like to use as a remote to control devices in my house and play games on.
Another stupid analyst, Apple don’t care about $199 market, they have the upper market and they make lots of money from it. Beside, they have ipod touch and iphone 4s, if anyone want to have the smaller device from Apple. Why Apple need mini ipad? At most, they will only lower the ipad2 price when they release the ipad3, just like what they do to iphone 4 when they have the new 4S, this guy doesn’t even use his brain at all.
I think given the analyst debacle around the iPhone 5 we can safely say that analysts don’t know jack. So, Brian White take your silly little troll bait post and stuff it.
Sam,
You are aware that Apple spent a lot of time, effort and money to determine the optimum size of the iPhone screen, right? The nice thing about the current screen size is that you can operate the phone single handedly with your thumb. I do this a lot. And after originally wanting a larger screen, the more I thought about it the more I think the smaller screen size has something going for it.
ah …bollocks, nuff said : )
Apple already have an iPad mini, it is called the iPod Touch.
Fucking stupid rumor thats not worth blog space.
that would be more like an 8GB, 16GB would be like $299.
Also given that China is all about making knockoffs of the current product I doubt that is why Apple might consider this similar to the iPhone tact.
More like they would do it for schools, and families that want to get one for the kiddies or need to because the school isn’t providing them
not to mention that this guy is talking about Apple making plans to counter a device that hasn’t actually shipped yet and could end up being a bomb when it comes to be an iPad killer because it seems to be focusing on a different audience.
it’s possible when Nov hits that Amazon will get their 1 million Fires sold and Apple will still manage to knock out 5 times that during the holidays. So what’s the concern.
I could see them moving the iPod touch up to a 4-5 inch screen if they were going to refocus it as more of a gaming device. Then that size might be useful and since a lot of the games are using a two thumb UI anyway, the lack of single hand sweep wouldn’t matter as much.
but the iPhone and the iPad I suspect will be left alone in terms of screen size.
they don’t rename the cheaper iPhones so if they are going for a same tact they likely wouldn’t change the name of the iPad either. it will still be the iPad 2
Personally I would love a 7″ form factor, but I don’t think it will happen.
Yes. Do some research. The majority of China is nothing like Beijing and Shanghai. That’s just the nice bits.
It’s simple. iPad 2 16GB goes to $349 and an ultra-awesome iPad 3 slinks into the traditional iPad pricing with a difference:
$499 – 32GB
$599 – 64GB
$699 – 128GB