It seems the competition is going to considerably heat up in the smaller tablet market as one of the biggest names in tech industry is finally going to set foot in that market. NYTimes today confirms that Apple will launch a smaller iPad, iPad mini later this year according to sources close to the company.

The report published by NYTimes mention regarding the smaller iPad that it is going to be announced later this year, will be around 7.85 inches and priced considerably less than the $499 iPad currently available.

The company is developing a new tablet with a 7.85-inch screen that is likely to sell for significantly less than the latest $499 iPad, with its 9.7-inch display, according to several people with knowledge of the project who declined to be named discussing confidential plans. The product is expected to be announced this year.

Well we already knew most of these details from previous rumours but the thing I find most interesting is the timing of this “apparent leak”. It seems it is a controlled leak by Apple as today is the eve of Nexus 7 launch. The 7 inch tablet from Google powered by Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

So it seems we are finally getting a Kindle Fire and Nexus 7 competitor from Apple.

The name, iPad mini which bloggers have given this smaller iPad might in fact be the next generation iPod touch which according to leaks have shown will be bigger than current models.

Another interesting thing that I should mention is that when Apple first decided with prototyping with the iPad before its launch, it was working on a 7 inch tablet but latter decided to go with a larger 9.7 inch iPad which it first showed the world in 2010.

Steve Jobs when presented with the idea on 7 inch iPad dismissed it as, it will only be good for “surfing the web in bathroom”. But he was also known to completely go 180-degree on comments, maybe to keep competitors away?

Well whatever is the case it seems we are finally going to get a 7.85 inch iPad later this year. Interesting?

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