Amazon said to tap Quanta for second-generation Kindle tablet

Amazon is already at work designing a successor to the seven-inch Kindle Fire, its foray into the hot tablet computing market. According to a Chinese-language Apple Daily story, relayed by DigiTimes, contract manufacturer Quanta Computers has been commissioned to build a second-generation Amazon tablet.

While the Kindle e-readers are being produced by rival Foxconn, rival Quanta allegedly snatched orders for Amazon’s Kindle Fire business. Also this:

Since Amazon has been increasing orders for Kindle Fire, the company has recently added chassis suppliers Nishoku into its supply chain, increasing the chassis supplier number from two to three. Nishoku will start shipping components at the end of 2011, the paper noted.

The device is said to retain the seven-inch form factor and should be ready by the second quarter of nexy year, barely six months following the September 28 launch of the Kindle Fire.

The tablet goes on sale tomorrow, price at $199, less than half the entry-level $499 price point for the 16GB WiFi iPad 2. If the notoriously inaccurate DigiTimes is to be trusted, Amazon will also out an 8.9-inch tablet device later this year. By all accounts, the online retail giant has hit the ground running with the Kindle Fire.

A Retrevo survey suggests that the Amazon tablet could be a smash hit this holiday season. Of those planning on buying a tablet, 44 percent would be willing to consider a Kindle Fire over an iPad. The findings echo Retrevo’s September research which asked folks whether they would consider a then unannounced tablet from Amazon over Apple’s iPad if the former were priced less than $250. A whopping 79 percent respondents said ‘yes’. Riding on the heels of favorable reviews, tomorrow’s Kindle Fire launch boosted Amazon shares which are now worth eight times Apple.