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Android seven-inchers swipe rug from under Apple

Now, though, competitors’ focus on the 7in segment of the market has started to pay off, most notably with growing sales of the Amazon Kindle Fire and the launch of Google’s Asus-made Nexus 7.

That has prompted Apple to get out a small tablet of it’s own, ABI suggested. “With the introduction of a smaller, lower-cost iPad Mini, Apple has acknowledged Android’s beachhead of 7in-class tablets,” said ABI senior practice director Jeff Orr.

Yet Apple doesn’t appear to have rushed the Mini to market. If the rumour-mill is anything to go by, Apple was working on the Mini during 2011, if only to have a design in the labs ready to release should the need arise.

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