Amazon’s Kindle Fire has been setting the news outlets ablaze lately with it’s announcement and recent release. Though it’s not a direct competitor of the iPad, there’s nothing to stop everybody from comparing it to the current king of touch screen tablets. The Kindle Fire is thicker than the iPad, lacks a camera, has no 3G internet, has minimal storage space, and has an uninspiring battery life… however that’s not raining on the Kindle Fire’s parade at all! Find out why inside!

Even though the Kindle Fire wilts in comparison to Apple’s iPad, it still is poised to become a major player and maybe even burn up some of Apple’s market share. There are two main reasons for this:

The Price Tag

The Kindle Fire is priced at a bare bones $199. In fact, Amazon is reportedly taking a ~$3 hit on every Kindle Fire sold. Of course, they will more than make that up when the user buys their first book or two, but this price point is very attractive to many. When compared to the iPad’s whopping $800 price tag, the Kindle glows with appeal to many in this penny pinched world right now.

The Brand

Amazon is a brand people trust. They can sell anything from books to refrigerators, and we buy it with confidence. Their internal recommendation engine is spot on, the reviews are actually useful, and shopping with Amazon is a delight! That alone will be enough to put the Kindle Fire on the map. If they can bring some of that magic to their internal Amazon App store for the Kindle Fire, then they will have a solid money maker on their hands. The vast library of books alone will be enough to sell this device if it is easily navigable and fun to shop around. This is something that Apple has yet to do with their own App store.

Avoiding The Issue All-together

The Kindle Fire is sneaky because instead of trying to compete directly with the iPad it is avoiding it altogether. Instead of coming out with a gadget that is over the top engineered with every bell and whistle, they are entering the low end market with a simple device that does everything it needs to well enough. It’s a smart play for Amazon. Most consumers buy something these days because it has Angry Birds on it and because it lets them read a book and watch movies. They don’t care about GHZ of processor power and GB or RAM or any of that stuff. And even though the Nook may be giving the Kindle Fire a run for it’s money, if the Kindle Fire Case and Covers market is any indication, accessory and case companies are banking on it’s success.

Amazon is putting bringing it’s vast wisdom of what sells and how to maintain a good brand into play with their Kindle Fire. They know how to reach their audience, and they know how to sell to them. The future of tablet computing is going to be quite exciting!