Widely touted as iPad-Killer, though, Kindle Fire failed to make any dent in core iPad market, but it succeeded in creating a new tablet
sub-segment. Kindle Fire is now flagship tablet for lower end of the market and Amazon has solid sales figures to corroborate this point. According to research firm Stifel Nicolaus, Amazon is estimated to have sold about 6 million tablets during the fourth quarter of the last year.
Stifen Nicolaus report also stated that Amazon used its distribution muscles for hard selling the tablet and the efforts yielded good results. The report said, "(Amazon) distribution prowess to define and dominate the low end of the device ecosystems." Stifen Nicolaus also noted that tablets are eating away PC market. The report goes on to note, "Tablets including iPad and Kindle Fire are rapidly taking share from PCs and notebooks. Kindle Fire has staked out an important market position due to its loyal Amazon customer base and attractive (low) device pricing."
The last quarter of the year had been good for Android tablets. According to Strategy Analytics, fourth quarter of the previous year saw shipment of 10.5 million Android tablets. This figure suggests that Android's share in tablet market hovers around 39 percent. Out of these Android tablets, 57 percent are Kindle Fire. However, these figures need to be taken with a bit of skepticism, since Amazon has so far shied away from providing official Kindle Fire sales data.