As Amazon has stepped into the tablet market with their low cost Android packing Amazon Kindle Fire, the latest word doing the rounds is that apparently Apple wants to take on the Kindle Fire by releasing an Apple iPad Mini in the early months of 2012.

According to the guys over at the Apple Insider, Brian White, an analyst for Ticonderoga Securities, in a note to investors said that in several meetings with supply chain firms says he’s been hearing “rumblings” of a “so-called iPad Mini” which is expected to surface next year.

Apparently thought that “Mini” tag may not necessarily refer to the size of the new Apple iOS slate, but rather to its low entry-level price tag, and that the tablet is expected to arrive in the “first few months of 2012.”

Delivering a new lower priced Apple iPad at that time would apparently enable Apple to break into a “more price sensitive consumer segment,” along with fending off the likes of the Amazon Kindle Fire tablet.

The analyst said in a note to investors, “We believe this lower priced iPad could be priced in the mid-to-high-$200 range. We expect this will be followed by a much more powerful, feature rich standard-priced iPad 3 in (the second quarter of 2012).”

According to White, a low cost Apple iPad Mini could be a big seller in China along with other developing countries and the analyst also believes there is a “major market opportunity in developed areas like the US and Europe.”

Obviously Apple isn’t going to come right out and confirm whether the tablet space will see an Apple iPad Mini early next year, so for now this should be treated as rumour. Though it seems to me that if true, perhaps Apple is a tad scared that there is a risk the Kindle Fire may take too much market share, market share that could belong to the iPad.

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