Apple’s largest production partner, Foxconn, has plans to build five new production plants in Brazil to help support the growing demand for the iPad tablet.

Officials from Foxconn and the Brazilian government will reportedly meet following the Chinese New Year to decide on where the factories will be built, but São Paulo is said to be pushing heavily for the investment. [...] In addition to helping supply Apple with iPads, the factories will be tooled for notebook and general electronics production. [...] A Foxconn representative declined to confirm its Brazilian expansion plans to Economia, calling the report “pure speculation.”

This news comes shortly after iPad production in Brazil got a generous tax break from local government following Foxconn reportedly investing up to $300 million in a São Paulo factory. The new production facilities could house up to 1,000 employees each, with officials from Foxconn and the Brazilian government said to be meeting after the Chinese New Year in order to make a final decision on the desired location.

With Apple selling through over 15 million iPads during Q1 2012, increasing production to help meet future demand is a no-brainer. And although Brazilian-made iPads may be a little behind schedule, adding more facilities to the mix can only help the situation in terms of availability.

Source: Folha via AppleInsider

According to Pew Research, tablet ownership among U.S. consumers nearly doubled from 10 percent to 19 percent over the holiday season.

The Pew project conducted three surveys, one in mid-December and two at the beginning of 2012. The results show a marked increase in ownership of tablets, e-readers, and the hybrids that exist somewhere between those two categories.

Pew and Venturebeat seem eager to credit the jump almost purely to Amazon Kindle Fire and other, similar low-priced entrants. That’s not entirely unfair since, frankly, cheap and good-enough sells. These are also U.S. numbers, which is the only market Amazon is competing in at the moment.

Apple will likely give us iPad 2 holiday numbers during their Q1 2012 conference call tomorrow. Amazon so far has declined to give specific Kindle numbers, and that may not change any time soon.

One thing is for certain — it may finally be a tablet market, not just an iPad market, and a growing one at that. (And Apple hasn’t even release the anticipated iPad 3 yet, so stay tuned.)

Source: Pew Research Center via VentureBeat

Octa WhaleTail and Vacuum Dock is a tablet holder that suctions to the back and contours the hand very nicely. To get the back to stick on the iPad all you have to do is put it on there, give it a few pumps and it’s on there, and rather firmly. Releasing the holder is pretty simple (once you get the hang of it) — pull up slightly on the two tabs and then push them in, and off it comes. Also included is the WhaleTail which hooks onto the back of the Vacuum Dock which allows the tablet to be propped up and it also doubles as a security measure for when you are carrying your tablet around so it doesn’t just fall right out of your hands.

Check out our live hands on from CES 2012.

Google has revamped Google Image search results on the iPad (and other tablets) and implemented a new carousel style user interface making it much easier to navigate. Gone are the days of viewing the full resolution image and having to go back to the results to see the next one; here are the days of simply swiping to the next full resolution image! Need more information on a particular image? Not a problem as all you have to do is tap the link in the lower left corner and the site begins to load. From the outside it looks exactly the same, but the new functionality is another page in Google’s redesign book.

Source: Google Mobile Blog

In a new survey conducted by ChangeWave, consumers polled over which tablet they’ll be purchasing this holiday season showed heavy demand for the Apple iPad over competing Android tablets and the Amazon Kindle Fire.

Apple continues to show enormous strength in the tablet market, where it’s enjoying the best quarter in its history, according to the survey. But while two-out-of-every-three future buyers plan on purchasing an Apple iPad (65%), for the first time since the launch of the original model, there is a double-digit contender for the number two spot. Better than one-in-five planned purchasers (22%) say they’ll buy a Kindle Fire.

Interestingly, it looks like the Kindle Fire may be eating away at Android tablet demand even though Android tablets have been on the market for some time now, which could be an added boon for Apple.

In addition, 74 percent of iPad owners are “Very Satisfied” compared to 49 percent for all other tablet makers combined. Looking at the market overall, demand for tablets in general has seen a large increase over the past few months, jumping from 6 percent of respondents to 14 percent.

With the majority of demand siding with Apple’s iPad, paired with general tablet interest more than doubling in the past 90 days, it’s easy to guess that Apple shouldn’t have too much difficulty holding a strong position in the market through 2012.

Source: ChangeWave

According to Economic Daily News out of Taiwan, Apple has purportedly paired up with LG Display and AU Optronics for a new 7.85-inch iPad to be released in early 2012. The smaller iPad would supposedly carry the same 1024×768 resolution of the current iPad 2, making a higher DPI level and helping Apple compete with the recently-announced 7-inch Kindle Fire.

This isn’t the first we’ve heard of a smaller iPad from Economic Daily News, as around the same time last year there were rumors of Apple prepping a 7-inch iPad for a Christmas 2010 release that never saw the light of day.

As with all iPad speculation, take this with a 7.8-inch grain of salt. Steve Jobs famously hated on the idea due to the lack of screen size limiting the quality of the apps.

Anyone else get the feeling the crazy rumor people won’t be happy until they’ve spread word of Apple making an imagined tablet in every size Samsung makes a real one?

Source: Economic Daily News via UnwiredView

Just a day after Apple announced the iPhone 4S, Samsung has filed two separate motions for preliminary injunctions to block sales of the iPhone 4S in Paris, France and Milan, Italy.

Apple has continued to flagrantly violate our intellectual property rights and free ride on our technology. We believe it is now necessary to take legal action to protect our innovation.

This move is an expected one, however, as Samsung has been holding their finger on the lawsuit button just waiting for the announcement.

What makes this one so interesting is that Samsung’s patents are FRAND, which means they’re licensed under fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory terms. That means Apple should simply be able to pay the same bill any other manufacturer has paid for their use. It’s also different from the design infringement and non-FRAND patents Apple is already suing Samsung over.

Source: Samsung

In an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos, President Obama revealed some well placed connections managed to get him his iPad sooner than most.

“Steve Jobs actually gave it to me, a little bit early,” the president said.

Obama used his early-access iPad to read newspapers that he previously read in print, along with skimming blog posts and other content on the tablet. He did mention, however, that he never comments on the blogs he reads because he has more important things to take care of.

Wouldn’t it be cool if he hit TiPb while perusing the blogosphere?

Source: NationalJournal via Cult of Mac

Rumor has it word that Amazon’s rumored 7-inch tablet will be known as the “Kindle Fire”, and in addition to a forked version of Android software, it might also be using a reduced cost version of the BlackBerry PlayBook hardware.

TechCrunch scored the name Kindle Fire, and says Amazon won’t be ready to release it until the second week of November. Ryan Block from GDGT further broke down the reasons TechCrunch felt inclined to compare the form-factor of the Kindle Fire to that of the Blackberry Playbook:

My sources tell me that RIM originally outsourced much of the hardware design and production of the PlayBook to mega-ODM Quanta — a company that builds, and sometimes helps design, hardware for name brands. The time eventually came that Amazon’s executives decided to do an Android tablet — far likelier to respond to the dark-horse success of the Nook Color than to the adjacent success of the iPad — Amazon’s own Kindle group (called Lab 126) apparently opted not to take on the project, in favor of continuing to work solely on next-gen E-Ink-based devices. From there, Amazon’s team determined they could build a tablet without the help and experience of Lab 126, so they turned to Quanta, which helped them “shortcut” the development process by using the PlayBook as their hardware template.

Block seems worried about this “shortcut” move by Amazon on the hardware, but TechCrunch asserts that the user-experience is top notch thanks to custom Android software running the tablet. Regardless, it’s an interesting pedigree to say the least.

Amazon has also apparently been working on last minute content deals with Fox for streaming movies and TV shows, and the tablet is expected to include their MP3 service and Kindle bookstore next to a proprietary Android Marketplace. Additionally, AllThingsD says a few big-name magazine publishers have signed on to provide content for the device.

When Amazon unveils its new iPad-like device on Wednesday, it will have the backing of at least three of the big magazine publishers: Hearst, Conde Nast and Meredith all have deals to sell digital versions of their titles on the new device, according to industry sources.

And then there’s the pricing issue. It was previously speculated that Amazon would price the tablet at around $250 with the inclusion of a free Amazon Prime membership, which comes with their popular streaming video service and free shipping on all products across the site. It’s now believed that Amazon may sell the Kindle Fire at $300 with Amazon Prime included, with another option available at $250 without the service.

We’ll have to wait and see after the announcement on Wednesday, but so far the rumor buildup has my curiosity piqued. Could this actually be the first real iPad competitor everyone has been waiting for, or will it only grow the still maturing tablet market even more?

Source: TechCrunch, GDGT, AllThingsD

Qantas has announced they will begin a trial run for an in-flight entertainment system centered around Apple’s iPad tablet, initially limiting the test to a single Boeing 767-300 which allows streaming of music and video content to all of the aircraft’s 254 seats.

In what it’s trumpeting as a ‘world first’, Qantas will next month begin trials of Apple’s iPad for in-flight entertainment, using wi-fi to stream content to the tablets from a central server on the aircraft.

The central server will use 5 WiFi access points throughout the aircraft, of which each iPad can connect to using a custom pre-loaded ‘Q Streaming’ app that bypasses Apple’s default iOS homescreen and instead presents users with an on-demand library of content to stream. Qantas says that if any passenger decides to take one home with them, the iPad will be essentially rendered useless outside of the aircraft thanks to their Q Streaming app lockdown.

Passengers who opt to bring their own tablet or laptop can also hook into the new content streaming system, and Qantas will additionally allow a 24-hour viewing window for those using their own device if the movie is cut short by the flight. If successful, Qantas will add an additional 10 aircraft to the program and they’re also considering bringing it to the Airbus A330.

I don’t know about you, but the prospect of being able to hook my iPad into a content-rich streaming system would surely make a cross-country flight a lot less unbearable.

[Australian Business Traveller]

Yesterday Microsoft gave us a brief look at its next operating system, code named Windows 8. The operating system will be aimed at not only desktop and laptop PC systems but also the tablet market. Will Windows 8 deliver enough for a Windows Tablet to become a real competitor to the iPad and iOS?

The answer at this stage is very unclear; Microsoft has previously claimed that older versions of Windows would work well on Table PC’s as well as desktop and laptop systems. Unfortunately a distinct lack of Windows tablet sales tell a completely different story. Apple on the other hand stepped in and released the iPad with a cut down version of OSX designed for touch input, all of a sudden Tablet devices were vogue and everyone wanted one!

Looking at the features of Windows 8, it could be a very appealing OS for Tablets. It integrates the Windows Phone 7 Metro UI with the full blown power of Windows . Any app you run on your desktop or laptop could be executed on a handheld tablet. That is very appealing; there is no doubt about that. What is a doubt however is Microsoft’s ability to deliver the full experience and make these apps usable with touch.

When I talk about experience I mean how easy the device is to use. Yes Windows 8 will be a great experience with a mouse and keyboard, I don’t doubt that. What I do have serious concerns over is how well that will work using your fingers. How will developers address the issue of not only writing their apps for a mouse and keyboard entry system but also for touch too? If they fail to do it, using a Windows Tablet will again be a frustrating experience.

Microsoft has a lot of work to do to bring all of this together. They need to consider every possibility with every app and interface. It needs to be standardized so users know where they are and how to get where they need to be without much thought. I really hope Microsoft can pull this off, they need to learn from previous mistakes and deliver a tightly integrated touch OS. Unfortunately history tells us they will fall way short of this goal.

If you want to see a short video of Windows 8, there is a demonstration video below from This Is My Next. Do you think Microsoft and its partners have what it takes to challenge Apple’s dominance in the tablet space?

[This is my Next]

The S2 is the interesting model as the form factor is totally different to anything we have seen before. It has two folding 5.5-inch screens that can work together or independently.

Not many more details are available at this stage as Sony say specifications are subject to change. The two models are slated for a release in the fall of this year.

Take a look at the short promo video after the break, then pop back here and let us know what your think of Sony’s tablets in the comments!

[Android Central]

To celebrate one million downloads of their SwiftKey keyboard app, TouchType is giving away a tablet each to THREE lucky winners! Which tablets? Whichever the winner chooses so long as they’re available for purchase for up to $800 where he or she lives. iPad 2, PlayBook, Xoom, Galaxy Tab are all on the table.

How do you enter? TouchType has put together a small survey which shouldn’t take more than five or ten minutes to complete. That’s it – well, that and a quick perusal of the official entry rules just to make sure you’re eligible (sorry minors and SPE employees). The contest is open to readers of Android Central, CrackBerry.com, TiPb, and WPCentral and ends at midnight Pacific on April 14th.

Not familiar with TouchType? You may have also seen that TouchType made a splash at this year’s CTIA with their tablet keyboard for Honeycomb – that’s coming soon, but SwiftKey is available now for Android devices.

So get cracking on the survey, folks – these tablets aren’t going to give themselves away.

The Loop was able to speak with Apple Spokesperson Trudy Muller today, who stated Apple saw consumer demand for the iPad 2 launch last Friday to be “amazing”.

“Demand for the next generation iPad 2 has been amazing,” Apple spokesperson Trudy Muller, told The Loop. “We are working hard to get iPad 2 into the hands of every customer who wants one as quickly as possible.”

Apple hasn’t announced how many iPad 2 units were sold over the opening weekend, but our guess is that Apple sold every single unit they were able to make and if they’d been able to make more, they’d have sold more. It took the original iPad 28 days to reach 1 million units. iPad 2 might easily have beaten that in a day.

What’s you guess? How many iPad 2s did Apple sell this weekend?

[The Loop]

Microsoft has started it’s war against Apple’s iPad, handing their reseller partners material to show their customers pointing to why the iPad is not the solution they should be using for their enterprise needs. Distributed starting around December of last year, the material lists reasons why people should either move away from the iPad for enterprise needs or why they should not go towards the iPad in the first place.

Absent from the anti-iPad materials seems to be information on what Microsoft plans to utilize on their own future tablets to combat the 7.3 million iPads sold in Q1 2011. Given past demos of Windows 7 tablets, most notably the HP Slate tablet, were far from touch friendly, and Steve Ballmer keeps insisting the touch-optimized Windows Phone 7 platform is staying put, that leaves Windows 8 on the table… when it gets ARM optimized in 2 years…

Meanwhile Apple is citing an unprecedented enterprise adoption rate with over 80% of Fortune 100 companies piloting or actively deploying iPad already. Microsoft is right to be worried but are these PowerPoint slides enough or do they have to field an actual device to compete with Apple?

[ ZDNet ]

According to unnamed sources in Taiwan there will be 3 different versions of the iPad 2 from Apple when it gets released in 2011, including the current Wi-Fi and UMTS 3G models, as well as a CDMA model for use with carriers like Verizon. From DigiTimes:

Apple is expected to release three versions of iPad 2, supporting either or a combination of Wi-Fi, UMTS and CDMA, for 2011 with mass production to start as early as the later half of January.

According to the rumor, Apple will begin production of 500,000 to 530,000 units during the 2nd half of January, and is expected to produce a ratio of 3:4:3 (Wi-Fi, UMTS, CDMA respectively) as it appears that 60-65% of current iPad shipments have been 3G models.

In addition to added wireless functionality, it looks like the iPad 2 might get a few other minor upgrades including better smudge-resistant screens with an anti-reflective treatment. This should help the iPad 2 better compete with eBook readers like the Amazon Kindle.

Although these are just rumors for now, it would be pretty great to see a Verizon iPad 2 released in 2011 next to a Verizon iPhone, don’t you think? Sound off in the comments below!

[DigiTimes]

Since a couple videos have started floating around on YouTube I figured it was about time I spoke up a little about my brief experience with the HP Slate. I had an opportunity to play with one about 3 months ago. HP apparently has a couple of these prototype devices they ship off to customers to tinker with and get feedback.

Now, my impressions have to be taken with a grain of salt since I am comparing a prototype, non-production device to the iPad, but I think certain truths will remain. For starters, the device is rather bulky, about 2-3 times thicker than the iPad. Once you get past the difference in physical thickness, your hands start to hurt, not because of the weight, but because the thing runs so hot your hands are burning after holding it for a few minutes.

Let’s talk features. I was curious to get the camera working. So, I looked for a physical hardware button to take a picture (because just about everyone other than Apple does that). Well, no photo button to be found. I was in the Windows 7 interface and could not find an camera app to launch. So I had to hunt for an alternative. HP has apparently built a custom skin for Windows 7 that gives the device a much more mobile feel with big buttons to launch apps and services. So, I launched that skin and found the camera app. The camera seemed to work well based on the fluorescently lite cubical environment, but hey, what can ya do. I now know why spy cam shots are always blurry and video is shaky.

I did not see the physical keyboard button when I had my time with the device, though I am sure it works fine. I did have the same difficult time scrolling (actually in this video, I don’t think he actually got it to scroll, but kept saying how fast it was. No comment there). Overall it was very lethargic and a challenge to use. Speaking of which, when in Windows 7 mode, it is impossible to do anything on screen as it is still using the mouse metaphor and there is a cursor on the screen; you don’t get the ease of use or speediness you get with iOS on iPad.

Again, these are my impressions of the prototype from a few months ago. Hardware changes, software changes and who knows what the final product will look like if it ever ships, but HP sure doesn’t appear like they are going to let this one go…

Here’s one of those videos from the ‘net, after the break.

An Android-based tablet was captured on video running Flash — or should we say trying to run Flash — before it crashes:

“Here’s a quick and dirty hands-on video review of the Android multi-touch tablet prototype (Android ipad). Yes, it does Adobe flash and air well.”

Ironically, you can hear the cameraman boast how he’s happy he did not purchase an iPad just as he goes to YouTube and the tablet crashes.

(For the record, after watching this video I am perfectly content with my iPad purchase.)

In fairness, this is beta software on a beta device, and it will no doubt improve as they throw time, money, and hardware at it. Then again, it’s 2010 and Apple’s had YouTube on the iPhone since 2007, and now have it on the iPad (running cool to the touch with 10 hours of battery life).

Is Adobe proving Steve Jobs right?

Video after the break!

[Daring Fireball]

UPDATE: TiPb was sent a transcript of the TD Newcrest Technology Conference, including the comments by RIM co-CEO Mike Lazaridi, so here they are in their entirety. On tablets:

Well. The trends we’ve been following have been an — there’s been, over the last three to four years, organizations have discovered the value of smartphones clearly, and that’s why we’re here, and that’s what we’re talking. And smartphones are always starting to space the need for laptops, but not all laptops, and not all needs. And I know that there are risks organizations that ask their customers when they join, when get hired, do you want a smartphone or a laptop very few get the opportunity to have both. So I think that’s an important thing, those are differentiated.

So the question you have ask yourself is when it comes to tablet, what market or what opportunities still it’s solving, what problem is it solving, and is it just a replacement laptop. I think that’s a difficult one to judge. But I think again if you look at what’s happening with smartphones are getting bigger, screens are getting bigger and getting more powerful and faster CPUs, more memory, we go in the 4G networks, we’ve got Wi-Fi, it’s just got everything, the operating systems are becoming more, more powerful, the tools are becoming more, more powerful, more applications are being developed, and are being used in more and more both enterprise and consumer spaces. So, I think at this point if you have to take the whole thing into consideration, you can’t say what’s the market for tablets in exclusion of the other devices, you have to put the whole thing together and I don’t think it’s that clear yet.

On touchscreen phones:

Well, I mean, clearly the best thing to do is to provide the choice and let the consumer and the customer to ultimately decide. I think what we’re seeing in the market though is that, it’s not clear if one side fits all and it really isn’t. And you can see it because a lot of people are realizing the incredible value and lifestyle improvement that are well-designed QWERTY push messaging experience brings to table. It’s really, really important. We’re finding — if you look at the surveys, you can see that large amount of the customers that have purchased touchscreen devices in last two years, they intend to get a device with the QWERTY keyboard on it now, right. I mean, they’ve got into a point where they’ve realize that a touchscreen alone is not enough; so that’s important.

I think with the trackpad technology is going into the BlackBerrys now, we provide a gesture and an elegance to control. Again, that’s unmatched. So, I think that is a third dimension, because you talk about touchscreen devices, you talk about QWERTY devices, but I would argue this is third, the whole control, command and control of things like well-designed trackpad technologies. I think, that’s really, really important. And I think, we continue to evolve with the research and invest in the Storm technology to make sure we get those right, we learned a lot and we continue to evolve that platform. I think that again what’s important is we provide that choice and we don’t lose sight of the fact what’s made us famous and what’s driving our sales, which is our QWERTY keyboards and our incredible track [indiscernible].

So not as cut and dried but we still have to wonder what surveys he’s reading that say people want to swap their touchscreens for QWERTYs because they’re not the ones we’re seeing.

And again, Apple’s sold 85,000,000 iPhone OS devices — including iPhone, iPod touch, and now iPad — to date.

[ORIGINAL STORY: Electronista via DF]

An employee of Asus — the company that builds many of Apple’s laptops — told CNET that they are making a tablet PC from Apple. It’s apparently a brand new tablet design, not one that Asus has used before. The device could be introduced as early as January, at Mac World Expo 2008. Crave at CNET surmises that the tablet will take many OS cues from the iPhone, incorporating finger flicking, cover flow, and other gesture-based movements.

Apple generally doesn’t enter a market unless nowadays unless they can clean house — there’s no real market leader in tablets, maybe some pent-up demand for them, but no single tablet model that ‘rules the roost.’ If Apple can make that device, and make it compelling, I could be aboard with that. The idea of replacing my laptop with a tablet and maybe a bluetooth keyboard, I could get along with that.