There is no doubt tablet ownership is on the rise. In fact, just this past holiday tablet ownership nearly doubled. Leading the trend most certainly is Apple with the iPad.

But consumers may wonder, with products like the Kindle Fire available at such a low cost, are iPad sales being hurt? The Kindle Fire can be purchased for around $200 and the iPad can range from $500 – $900. That’s a pretty steep jump for most consumers. I would think it would hurt Apple sales but, they are not really the same products. Do consumers even consider the Kindle Fire a viable option if they aspire to an iPad? If not, we shouldn’t see any impact on iPad sales.

Apple CEO Tim Cook reports:

“I looked at the data – particularly in the US – on a weekly basis after Amazon launched the Kindle Fire, and in my view there wasn’t an obvious effect on the [iPad sales] numbers”.

When asked about Kindle customers taking the next step to iPad because of the inherent limitation’s of Fire and disregarding the price jump Cook commented:

“Whether that’s happening on a very, very large basis, I don’t know, again, my own view is – looking at our data in the US – there was no obvious change“.

Cook elaborates further regarding e-readers and other tablet computers:

“There’s clearly customers that will buy those and I think they’ll sell a fair number of units, but I don’t think that people who want an iPad will settle for a limited-function [replacement]”.

So from Apple’s perspective at least, there is no substitute yet on par with the iPad. But I think there is more competition on the way. This marks the third year since the iPad was released. Let’s see what comes out this year though I know there’s a great deal of brand loyalty for Apple products so it’ll take some pretty outstanding innovation to entice perspective buyers away from the iPad.