The Google Nexus 7 is one of the best tablets available for under $200. According to new figures revealed by Asus, it may also be one of the best selling. Speaking during an Asus quarterly earnings call, the company’s chief financial officer said close to a million units were sold in the latest month.

The figures were lower in previous months, but sales have apparently been picking up steam.

Google Nexus 7

Asus manufactures the Nexus 7 tablet for Google. According to report in the Wall Street Journal, about 500 thousand units per month were moving at first, but the numbers climbed to 600 thousand, then 700 thousand before approaching 1 million units per month.

It’s possible that the introduction of new inexpensive tablets including the Amazon Kindle Fire HD, B&N NOOK HD, and Apple iPad Mini could slow sales in the future. Google has also revealed a new 10 inch Nexus tablet with a starting price of $399.

But Asus and Google are also keeping the Nexus 7 family up to date by adding a 32GB model and introducing a new version with 3G capabilities.

The Google Nexus 7 features a 7 inch, 1280 x 800 pixel display, an NVIDIA Tegra 3 quad-core processor, 1GB of RAM, and 16GB to 32GB of storage. It runs Google Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, but as a Nexus device I suspect it’ll be among the first products in line for an Android 4.2 software update once Google’s new operating system is ready to go.

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10 replies on “Google and Asus now selling nearly a million Nexus 7 tablets per month”

  1. Duh. Give a tablet away for free and they sell like crazy. HP TouchPad is the greatest tablet ever (no it isn’t) if you want to look at sales and the frenzy it created. Oh, that happened because they cost next to nothing to buy. Selling lots of something is a great headline for bragging rights until a company shows profits. Apple has it right but nobody else has the sales volume to profit ratio anywhere near respectable. Yay, Amazon sold amazing amounts of the Kindle Fire. Yeah, wasn’t that a break even proposition? Oh, but they get the bragging rights? Look ma I sold the most tablets and made no money doing it. How it that impressive? I don’t get it.

    1. But it’s not just about the number of units sold. Asus’s bottom line was boosted by the sales of the Nexus 7 — they did indeed make a profit from those millions sold. Google benefits less directly, but every Android user they gain, the more services and advertising they can sell.

      And those millions of Kindles and Kindle Fires Amazon has sold? Every one of those (with the exception of a few that have been modded for Android) is an exclusive sales conduit and marketing tool for Amazon services and products, and they put it in the hands of their customers at no net cost to themselves.

      It’s funny though. First people bashed Android for having no tablet sales worth speaking of, then the Kindle Fire came along and sold millions. Next it was, “well yeah but they can’t make a profit while doing it” and then the Nexus 7 comes along and boosts Asus’s profits. Now they’re stuck on “well yeah but they still can’t as fast as the iPad” as if it’s some kind of p***ing match.

      Did anyone even claim that the Nexus 7 was the death knell of the iPad? I don’t recall anyone saying that. By any sensible measure, the Nexus 7 is off to a good start no matter what some people claim.

      1. I agree with what you’re saying. The fact is that Google has everything to gain. Amazon has everything to gain from selling the Kindle Fire at essentially break even or at a loss. Asus is only gaining some snazzy headlines from being part of the Nexus 7. They are driving sales from their own 10-inch tablets. They can’t even release a competing 7-inch device. Business is about profit and you can only keep going for so long if it means that the payoff isn’t worth the effort. As in, yes we can produce millions of these things and make next to nothing and meanwhile our company isn’t gaining real profit. At some point a company has to find another line of products or they will simply become stagnant.

        People fail to realize the company who gains from break even tablet sales is Google. Is Asus getting a cut of Google Play revenues or some of the associate ad revenues, etc? At some point Android is going to kill itself because it’s becoming a partnership for sending people to Google Play. It’s not a neutral OS. Amazon is more authentic in the sense that it’s their own device. It’s not like Amazon is asking Asus to produce a tablet which is designed to send people to the Amazon store exclusively. That would be silly no? However it seems to be okay for Google to do this with Android. People fail to see the big picture at times.

        That said, my next tablets would be the Nexus 7 and Nexus 10. Why spend more than I need to?

        1. “Asus is only gaining some snazzy headlines from being part of the Nexus 7.”

          Wrong.
          It’s actually what’s driving their profits.
          Google “Nexus 7 profits Asus” and you’ll see.
          You’re clearly misinformed and develop arguments on false premises.
          Therefore your conclusion can only be invalid.

          “my next tablets would be the Nexus 7 and Nexus 10. Why spend more than I need to?”
          So, you contradict yourself with this ‘confession’.
          But that’s still the best choice, now.
          Why should we care about the amount of profit a company makes when selling a profit?
          As long as it’s not ridiculous margins a la Apple (or every OEMs selling the new hybrids, or even high end smartphones), why complain?
          I don’t care about their business model if I have a device with great value (features/price).
          I’m a CUSTOMER, not a shareholder nor a fanboy who rejoices when my favorite company announces quaterly profits. Since, the more they make profits, the more it means they’re over charging me.

          1. The fact that I would buy those tablets means nothing against what I’m saying.

            Clearly you don’t get it. You can sell a tablet at break even when it’s not the hardware that brings in profit. Heard about Kindle Fire? Nexus 7 is the same business model. If selling at that price is such a great idea, why is Google the only one who can do it? Huh? Yeah, because it would be considered a fire sale.

            Asus can make some profit from accessories. Perhaps Google has offered extra arrangements with Asus because the hardware isn’t bringing in cash flow. All the headines are about how many units they are able to sell and that Asus will be the number 2 tablet seller. Well, possibly, but again if you sell something for a reduced and bottom price, naturally it will sell in bundles. Look no further than the HP TouchPad. Impressive sales eh?

            My point is that bragging about units sold is lame. It’s meaningless. All it really means is that you’re proving if you charge the least for a product, chances are you will be the best selling. Of course Apple being the amazing exception to the rule.

          2. Read this:

            https://www.engadget.com/2012/10/30/asustek-q3-net-profits-up-43-percent/

            And if prices/margins are usually higher is because ALL companies are greedy by nature. They try to charge you the (maximum) amount they think they can get away with.

            Or, they try to compensate a lower margin by quanttity sold.

            It’s what Asus did here. And they make ACTUAL profits on the device itself.

            Google may have chosen, not too but that’s irrelevant since it just put their name on the device.

            If they took an extra margin too, that would be one that doesn’t exist usually anyway (when products are sold directly by and under the OEM name).

            Asus could have done the same tablet at the same price without Google involved.

            In fact, they intended to and announced they were going to produce a 7″ tablet at this price (with even better features lie HDMI and µSD ports, but with a lower screen res I guess) Google joined in late. Have you heard of the Memo 370T?

          3. The market will speak. If you start seeing HP, Dell, Toshiba, etc pull out, reduce or avoid 7-inch Android tablets you know why. In short time the only players will be the companies who have the ecosystem and make money from that and not the actual device.

            Frankly I don’t give a rats A about whether a company is profiting or not. However, take a look at the music business. That’s good now compared to the 80’s? Why does it suck now? Yeah, perhaps profits or lack thereof. Profit creates interest and innovation. Break even creates stagnation and lack of competition. Who the F wants to compete on a product that fetches $1 when there is other products that fetch a profit of $20 or $50 etc? The answer is clear.

            Come full circle and you will understand why there aren’t 10 netbook models on store shelves right now. Where did all the manufacturers go? Yeah, exactly. Point made. Done with this conversation.

  2. Leaving fanboyism aside for a moment, this is good news for everybody, including Apple fans. Competition is healthy and it’s good to see both Microsoft and Google stepping up to the plate. It’s too early to tell whether Surface will succeed (I suspect it will) or whether the Nexus 10 can repeat its smaller brother’s success (need to see the reviews first), but even Apple fans should be rooting for them to work out, given that it will push Apple to continue innovating to maintain their market share.

    1. I think that, unfortunately, Apple fanboys (not average Apple’s customers) wish nothing less than the failure of every other company.

      They’re so blind that they don’t care about the positive factors competition can induce.

      In fact, they simply consider it as a threat, an affront to the high/premium status of Apple’s products.
      A better product cannot exist.
      So, if objectively, one is launched, it must be ridiculed and attacked by any mean necessary.
      How could they explain the premium price they pay and the pride they have in owning their device otherwise?

      Apple can sell them pretty much everything it wants, at the price it wants, they’ll not only buy it but still say it’s the best choice/device simply because of iOS (the “best mobile OS on the planet”) and the logo.

      Look at the reviews and Apple’s fanboys reaction to the iPad Mini despite its price, the lightning connector and the $50 proprietary adapters, GoogleMaps, the scuffgate, stagnant iOS, convergence (hybrid devices) denial…

      No, the definition of a fanboy implies his/her utter subjectivity. So, don’t expect rationale frome them.

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