Steve Jobs ‘receptive’ to iPad Mini idea

Steve Jobs may not have been against a 7-inch iPad after all, according to a senior Apple employee.

The main counterargument to rumours of a forthcoming 7-inch iPad Mini is that former CEO Steve Jobs declared the concept ‘DOA’ (dead on arrival), but company vice president Eddy Cue described the late iPhone guru as being ‘very receptive’ to the idea.

Internal documents have emerged during Apple and Samsung’s ongoing legal battle and the latest is an email from Cue, dated late January 2011.

The message is addressed to a collective of senior Apple figures including current CEO Tim Cook, senior vice president of marketing Phil Schiller and senior vice president of iOS software Scott Forstall.

Said email includes an article comparing Samsung’s 7.7-inch Galaxy Tab favourably to the 9.7-inch iPad, along with a statement from Cue:

‘Having used a Samsung Galaxy, I tend to agree with many of the comments below (except actually moving off the iPad). I believe there will be a 7” market and we should do one. I expressed this to Steve several times over Thanksgiving and he seemed very receptive the last time.'

'I found email, books, facebook and video very compelling on a 7”. Web browsing is definitely the weakest point, but still usable,’ he added.

Of course, none of this necessarily means the iPad Mini is actually real, but it does point to the fact that the company has taken the idea seriously in the past, despite some of Jobs' public comments, and, importantly, noted the positive points of the smaller form factor.

Rumours of the iPad Mini suggest it’ll feature a 7.85-inch display. There’s some indication the device would be launched as a budget model as a riposte to Google’s £199 Nexus 7 and, if so, it may not feature a Retina-quality display resolution.

Other speculation has floated the idea of an external build similar to the iPod Nano series of music players.

Most recently, Paul Semenza, an analyst at NPD DisplaySearch, predicted iPad Mini production would begin in August with a view to devices hitting shelves in ‘late 2012’.