In an interview with BloombergAmazon’s head of consumer electronics, Panos Panay, confirmed the company would phase out the Fire brand in favor of Alexa Tablets.
The new lineup runs proper Android, instead of the custom Fire OS, and has full access to the Play Store, which wasn’t available on Fire tablets. To make matters worse, Gmail, Google Calendar, YouTube, Google Drive, and other services were only available via the browser on Fire tablets; the official Google apps were not available in the Amazon Appstore.
The fire tablet line “wasn’t giving customers what they were asking for,” Panay told Bloomberg, which appears to be access to Google services, higher-quality hardware, and less in-your-face advertising on the lock screen. Amazon will still provide security updates for Fire tablets. “We won’t leave any customer behind,” Panay said. But don’t expect any hardware refreshes.
Panay also said Amazon has more hardware announcements coming throughout the fall, but don’t expect an Amazon-branded computer or laptop.
