Cheaper tablet on way from Amazon.com

AMAZON.COM has struggled to draw customers to its pricier tablets. So it is going further down-market.

The Seattle-based online retailer plans to release a $50 (R685) tablet with a 15.25cm screen in time for this year’s holiday season‚ according to people familiar with the matter.

That would make it one of the least-expensive tablets on the market and half the price of the company’s current Fire HD tablet of the same size.

The move would potentially attract buyers looking for a simple – and effectively disposable – device for straightforward tasks like streaming video at home and shopping on Amazon.com.

But such inexpensive tablets typically come with compromises such as inferior screen quality‚ durability or battery life in comparison to more expensive tablets like Amazon’s larger Fire tablets and industryleading devices such as Apple’s iPad.

For instance‚ the $50 device would have a mono speaker‚ rather than stereo‚ one of the sources said.

The $50 device was part of a slate Amazon is planning to release this year that will also include tablets with 20cm and 25cm screens‚ according to sources.

Amazon has long sought to undercut its hardware competitors‚ in part by eschewing profits on the devices themselves.

Rather‚ chief executive Jeff Bezos has said‚ the company prefers to make money by selling services that work with the devices‚ such as e-books.

“Will people tolerate a poten- tially inferior experience just because a tablet is $50?” a Forrester Research analyst, Frank Gillett, said.

“Amazon has to be very careful about what they’re giving up to get to that low price point.”

An Amazon spokeswoman declined to comment.

To lower costs for the new tablet‚ Amazon outsourced much of the development to overseas firms including Shanghai Huaqin Telecom Technology and Taiwan’s Compal Communications‚ two sources said. – Wall Street Journal