14 DAY TRIAL // Amazon had great success with its recently released Kindle Fire 7-inch tablet, but according to an analyst this is only the beginning as in 2012 the outfit could sell as many as 12 million of these $199 (147.7 EUR) devices.
If the 12 million unit estimate will end up being right this could bring Amazon a large chunk of the tablet market.
Citi analyst Mark Mahaney, which was cited by All Things D, believes that the 12 million Fires sold will enable Amazon to take away a 15 percent share of this market from Apple.
If Mahaney's estimates will hold, the Fire will end up generating about $3.2 billion in revenue or about 5 percent of Amazon’s 2012 total.
“The path is clear,” says Mahaney. “With an aggressive pricing strategy, an unmatched content cross-sell opportunity, a market-smart form factor, and probable product improvements – Amazon can own a substantial segment of the Tablet market.”
Amazon unveiled the Kindle Fire on September 28 and the tablet is based on a customized version of Android, that comes with an unique interface to detach itself form all the other tablets out there running this OS.
Hardware wise, the Fire has a 7-inch IPS screen with a 1024x600 resolution, Gorilla Glass coating, a dual-core processor, and all of these are fitted inside a chassis that weighs 14.6 ounces (roughly 413 grams).
Connectivity options include only Wi-Fi, but Amazon makes up for this by enabling its customers to access a wide variety of content through the Android Appstore and Kindle books service, all stored for free via the company's Cloud Storage.
The 7-inch Amazon Kindle Fire retails for $199, which as Mahaney points out is one of the main reasons why it has become so popular among users looking to buy such a device.