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HP senior vice president Jon Rubinstein, who was part of the Apple team that brought the world the iPod, unveiled the TouchPad to applause in a pavilion on the San Francisco shoreline within sight of the Golden Gate Bridge.
"TouchPad is more than just a pretty face," Rubinstein said as he caressed one on stage. "The TouchPad is all about you; how you work, play, and connect with the things you value most."
TouchPad will be the first tablet in a family of products based on a webOS software platform Palm began building from the ground up about five years ago.
HP last year bought Palm in a $1.2-billion deal in what analysts believe was a move to get its hands on the platform that could make it a player in the fast-growing market for smartphones and tablet computers.
"No one has come close to replicating our webOS experience," said Rubinstein, who was chief executive of Palm when it was acquired by HP.
TouchPad weighs about 1.5 pounds (0.7 kilogrammes) and has a 9.7-inch (24.6 centimetre) display - the same weight and screen size as the iPad.
The tablet is built with a Qualcomm processor that is "screaming fast," according to Rubinstein. HP did not disclose the price.
TouchPad software is crafted for easy multi-tasking and supports Adobe Flash software commonly used in online video. The tablet also features a camera for video calling.
The iPad does not run Flash or have a camera.
"This product has a chance to beat RIM (BlackBerry maker Research In Motion) and any individual Android tablet, but not Apple," Forrester Research analyst Sarah Rotman Epps said of the TouchPad. "Consumers will consider the TouchPad, and then buy an iPad."
The TouchPad is likely to win over application developers because it should be relatively easy to convert software crafted for iPads and HP will allow freedom when it comes to making money from "apps," the analyst added.
Forrester predicted that more than 24 million tablets, most of them iPads, will be sold in the United States this year.
TouchPad launch partners will include digital magazine publishers such as Time Inc. and electronic book giant Amazon.
"We are making this a great platform for reading books by partnering with Amazon on Kindle software," Rubinstein said.
WebOS strengths included multi-tasking capabilities that allow for someone to pause while reading an e-book to take a video call, search out a Web page and print wirelessly to an HP printer.
"All other tablets seem limited in what they can do and when they can do it, but with the TouchPad you can do it all at the same time," said DreamWorks film studio chief executive Jeffrey Katzenberg.
DreamWorks has worked closely with HP on collaboration and animation systems and gear for a decade.
HP plans to use its global resources to back the TouchPad along with an entire webOS "ecosystem" consisting of soon-to-be-released Veer and Pre 3 smartphones and a line of personal computers built on the platform.
HP declined to provide more details regarding whether its personal computers would be running expressly on webOS in a direct challenge to machines based on the Windows operating systems made by long-time partner Microsoft.
The California-based computer titan is putting "meaningful talent and significant resources" into webOS, according to Todd Bradley, executive vice president of the personal systems group at HP.
HP estimated that the market for gadgets linked to the Internet is $160 billion and "growing fast."
- AFP/de
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