Rumor: next Nexus tablet will have an 8-inch screen and possibly Intel soc

Google would focus on 8″ tablets by mid-year and the Nexus 8 may get a Bay Trail-generation Intel processor, rumored site Digitimes writes. The company would focus on a slightly larger screen size due to increased competition from cheap 7″ tablets.

Sales of the Nexus 7 would be disappointing due to fierce competition from other cheap 7″ tablets with Android. That is why the Nexus 8 would have an 8″ screen, claims Taiwanese site Digitimes, which has a mixed history when it comes to the correctness of rumours, but which does have good sources from Taiwanese companies.

According to the site, Asus has the best papers to make the Nexus 8, because of the close relationship the company has built with Google in the manufacture of the Nexus 7 models. Google would further lean towards the Intel-Atom based on the Bay Trail platform as a processor for the Nexus 8, but Qualcomm would still be in the running.

The current Nexus 7 includes a Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro, while the first generation had an Nvidia Tegra 3. Many manufacturers have recently released or announced 8″ tablets, such as Apple, Acer, Asus, Lenovo and Samsung. Incidentally, a few months ago, an unannounced tablet appeared in a video from Google that was suspected to be the Nexus 8.