Amazon unveils Kindle Fire tablet

Amazon.com Inc unveiled its long-awaited tablet computer today with a $199 price tag, potentially cheap enough to give Apple Inc's iPad some serious competition for the first time.

Jeff-Bezos-Chairman-and-CEO-of-Amazon-com-introduces-the-Kindle-Fire-at-a-news-conference-in-New-York-The-e-reader-and-tablet-has-a-7-inch-17-78-cm-multicolor-touchscreen

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 % to $231.29 in morning trading, while Barnes & Noble, maker of the Nook e-reader, dropped 6.2 % 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.