Samsung
Electronics, the second-largest maker of tablets after Apple, said it
is putting three new tablets in the Galaxy Tab 3 series on sale in the
US on July 7. The cheapest, a $199 device, will have a screen that
measures 7 inches diagonally. An 8-inch model will go for $299 and a
10-inch one for $399.
"Our goal is to attract
Galaxy smartphone users, and to make it the ultimate smartphone
accessory," said Shoneel Kolhatkar, director of product planning at
Samsung Mobile.
The "Tab" line is Samsung's
value brand, undercutting the price of similar Apple models. Samsung's
premium tablets are in the "Note" line, which include styluses. The
7-inch and 10-inch tablets had "Tab 2" equivalents, but the 8-inch model
is new, and coincides closely in size with Apple's iPad Mini, which
came out late last year.
The new tablets have
the same three buttons on the front as the Galaxy smartphones. Last
year's Tab 2 had no physical buttons on the front, as encouraged by
Google, which supplies the Android software.
The
7-inch Galaxy Tab 3 has 8 gigabytes of storage memory, while the larger
models have 16 gigabytes.of them have card slots for memory expansion.
Samsung
and Apple are in a heated tussle when it comes to smartphones and
tablets. Each company wouldto dominate both markets. Samsung had 18 per
cent of the global tablet market in the first quarter this year,
according to research firm IDC. Apple had 40 per cent. In smartphones,
the figures are reversed, with Samsung dominating, largely because of
its Galaxy line. Apple came in second with a 17 per cent market share
for the iPhone. In the US, however, Samsung is outsold by Amazon.com,
with its Kindles.
Forrester Research analyst JP
Gownder said a hit smartphone traditionally hasn't led buyers to get a
tablet the same manufacturer. He believes Samsung will get a bigger
boost its new mini-stores inside US Best Buy locations. Having a retail
environment it can control bridges some of the gap with Apple, which has
its own stores.
"Whether you buy it online or in person, people want to touch and feel these products," Gownder said.
Samsung
has declined to challenge the iPad on screen resolution. The new
tablets have the same resolution as older models, leaving them well
behind the iPad and even Samsung's flagship Galaxy S4 smartphone. The
10-inch tablet has a resolution of 1280 by 800 pixels, compared with
1920 by 1080 for the phone. The smartphone packs in three times more
detail in a square inch than the tablet does. (The 8-inch Tab 3 does,
however, have a slightly higher screen resolution than the iPad Mini,
the closest Apple equivalent.)
Analyst Jeff Orr
at ABI Research said that the new Samsung tablets aren't
"groundbreaking in any particular direction," it shows the South Korean
company is honing a strategy that's been successful in smartphones:
producing a wide variety of devices for different customer segments.
"Samsung
has certainly shown how that can be accomplished with handsets, and I
see more of that occurring now with the Galaxy Tab 3 announcement," Orr
said.
With the new models, Samsung will have
five tablets on sale in the US, compared to two at Apple. In addition,
Samsung sells the Galaxy Note II, a phone-tablet crossover device.
The
10-inch model is the first Android-powered Samsung tablet to use an
Intel processor. That's a significant win for the Santa Clara,
California, chipmaker, which has been trying to break into the market
for cellphone and tablet chips now that PC sales are slumping. Other
smartphones and tablets run chips made by a variety of companies,based
on designs ARM Holdings PLC, a British company.
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