Amazon Kindle Fire shipments said up to 5m in 2011 alone
updated 10:50 pm EST, Wed November 9, 2011
Amazon's secret Kindle Fire numbers possibly shown
Amazon's claims of ordering "millions more" Kindle Fire units may have been borne out by a leak Wednesday. Having already bumped its original order from 3.5 million to four million, Amazon was said by Digitimes' purported supply chain sources to be boosting production to "more than five million." It expected demand to keep increasing after the end of 2011, leading it to ask for more to keep up its supply.
The data if accurate isn't likely to ever be confirmed by Amazon, which regularly keeps its shipment volumes secret under claims that they would give up a competitive advantage. While CEO Jeff Bezos' claims of millions of extra shipments is a slight exaggeration, the original increase from 3.5 million to five million would still see Kindle Fire orders jump about 43 percent in a matter of weeks.
Amazon is known to be taking a loss on each Kindle Fire sold as it has warned of a drop in profit for the fall that most expect is to absorb the hidden costs. In getting the Android tablet to $199, however, it may stand to outsell every other Android tablet during at least the holidays and could dictate the direction of Google's platform in spite of excluding its apps. The shipments still won't approach that of the iPad, but they could likewise be the first to get an individual Android maker more than a few percent in market share.
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Sep 2010
Gobbling up the Android marketshare...
Will this hurt Android in the long run as the low margins and low volumes of other Android tablet makers result in zero profits or even losses. They'll have to exit the market and look at Windows 8 as their saviour.
Meanwhile Apple will continue to to sail along selling iPad 2's to their hearts content and reaping 50%+ tablet profits.