Since
the Amazon Kindle Fire had been launched in September 2011 as noted in my blog article
entitled “Amazon
Kindle Fire is now No. 2 behind the Apple iPad 2 - Deathrace to London Olympics
2012AD”, it has been giving the Apple iPad a lot of competition by
popularizing the 7" category of Tablets.
Amazon
has followed up with an update of their Amazon Fire Tablet line in 2014 that
has many Amazon Prime members spoilt for choice as reported in the article “Your handy Amazon
Kindle Fire cheatsheet”, published September 19, 2014 by Eric Franklin, CNET News. The Tablets in the 2014 line that
was released in September and October 2014 are as follows:
1.
Kindle Fire HD6
2.
Kindle Fire HD6
3.
Kindle Fire HD Kids Edition
4.
Kindle Fire HDX 7
5.
Kindle Fire HDX 8.9
These
are all small form-factor Kindle Fires of varying Screen sized and prices as
listed in the table below.
So
what lies ahead for the Amazon Fire Kindle in 2015, given that Tablet sales are
falling globally according to analyst IDC in February 2015 according to my blog article
entitled “IDC
Stats suggest Tablet Freefall in 2015 – How to sell Tablets using built-in
Keyboards and Carrier Unlocked SIM Cards”.
Apple and Amazon battle
in the 7" Category - Tablet glory of Days past slowly fading
The
Amazon Kindle fire was truly a game-changer when it was launched back in 2011,
as it proved the viability and hidden love for the 7" Tablet form factor.
So
much so that Apple eventually launched the 7.9" Apple iPad Mini in 2012 at
a time when the world was falling in love with the 7" Tablet form, factors
as noted in my Geezam blog article entitled “The
Two Towers of Tablets, 7” Amazon Kindle Fire and 7.9” Apple iPad are the Global
Tablet size of Choice”.
At
the same time, Amazon updated their Kindle Fire line with improvements to the
Kindle Fire line, mainly upgrading the Processor and the Screen resolution as explained
in my blog
article entitled “Amazon
launches a pair of Kindle Fire 2 - ACS-Xerox Call Centers in Jamaica ramp up as
Kindle Fire begin to Sparkle”.
Since
then, these 7" Tablets made by both Apple and Amazon have been refreshed
on a yearly basis.
Apple
soon followed up in October 2013 with the Apple iPad Mini 2 as noted in my blog article
entitled “Apple
iPad 5 and iPad Mini 2 Launch Event expected on Tuesday October 22nd
2013 - 64-bit Quad-core A7 Processors, Touch ID, Apple Mac Pro and Apple iTV
Video Game Console anticipated”.
The
Apple iPad 5 also got rebranded as the Apple iPad Air, stealing some of the
thunder from the Apple Macbook Air as note in my Geezam blog article entitled “Apple
iPad Air’s the World Thinnest Tablet and Apple iPad Mini 2’s a 3DS and Vita
killer”.
Amazon focuses on
E-Readers in 2014 with Kindle Unlimited – Delaying the inevitable Tablet
Extinction
Amazon
opted to update the Amazon Paperwhite, their popular e-reader, with a few
hardware and software upgrades as reported in my blog article
entitled “US$199
Amazon Kindle Paperwhite upgrades Hardware and Software - How to find free
Ebooks and e-Book Readers for Laptops and PC”.
They've
even thrown in the option of an all-you-can-read US$8.99 Amazon Kindle
Unlimited e-book subscription in June 2011 as reported in my blog article
entitled “Amazon
launches US$9.99 Kindle Unlimited - Oyster and Scribd got served by Earth’s
Most Customer Centric Company but pay Indies Publishers better”.
But
this is delaying the inevitable, as since the second half of 2014, branded
Tablet sales are being cannibalized by Chinese “White-Label” Generic Tablets and
to a lesser extent the growing trend of phablets as predicted in my blog article
entitled “Gartner
and IDC Forecast Tablets, PC fall, Smartphone rise - How Tablet's 3-Year
Lifespan means Sub-US$199 Smartphones, Chrome OS to Dominate”.
They've
been affecting the sales of the Apple iPad and even the Google Nexus 9 Tablet
as explained in my blog article
entitled “US$183
Google Nexus 9 Tablet – Tablet Extinction coming as @googlenexus Strategy
needed for Content Creation Tablet Market”.
So
it'll be interesting to see what Amazon has in store for their refresh of their
Amazon Kindle Fire line of Tablets in face of the declining interest in Name
brand Tablets, now perceived as being overpriced.
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