New York: Amazon.com Inc unveiled its long-awaited tablet computer on Wednesday with a $199 price tag, potentially cheap enough to give Apple Inc's iPad some serious competition for the first time.
At a news conference Wednesday morning in New York, Amazon launched the Kindle Fire, a tablet with a seven-inch screen, free data storage in the cloud and a new Internet browser called Amazon Silk.
Amazon Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos also unveiled the Kindle Touch, an e-reader with no buttons and a touch screen starting at $99, along with a basic Kindle e-reader at a new price of $79.
"These are premium products at nonpremium prices," Bezos said. "We are going to sell millions of these."
Amazon shares rose 3.2 per cent to $231.29 in morning trading, while Barnes & Noble, maker of the Nook e-reader, dropped 6.2 per cent to $12.39.
Analysts expected the tablet to be priced around $250, roughly half the price of Apple's dominant iPad, which starts at $499. The Nook Color e-reader costs $249.
Having its own tablet is important for Amazon because the company has amassed a mountain of digital goods and services that could be sold through such a device.
As the world's largest Internet retailer, a tablet might also encourage Amazon customers to shop online for physical products more often.
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