Telstra axes T-Touch Tab

TELSTRA has pulled its first tablet device from the market after a year of disappointing sales and will instead start selling Apple's iPad 2. Telstra confirmed yesterday it had withdrawn its T-Touch Tab, which it launched a year ago. Advertisement: Story continues below The device was manufactured by Chinese company Huawei but was branded as a Telstra device - known as white labelling. With a price tag of $300, it was aimed at consumers who could not afford or did not want a branded tablet device. A spokesman for Telstra said it had sold ''tens of thousands'' of the T-Touch Tabs, but ''after almost a year on shelves, the T-Touch was retired from our range''. Telstra advertised its devices on its company blog - Telstra Exchange - and still advertises the T-Touch Tab on its website. It did not sell Apple's first iPad but will start selling the second version within weeks. It still plans to sell two other tablets, by Motorola and Acer. Huawei marketed the T-Touch globally as the S7 Tablet and has started replacing it with a new device it calls the MediaPad. From now on, the devices Huawei sells will be under its own brand. The T-Touch Tab is believed to be one of the last of its white-label products. According to Merrill Lynch telecommunications analyst Sameer Chopra, consumers are increasingly moving towards devices with strong brands or that are part of an ''ecosystem'' that contains applications and connecting devices. ''Take up of white-label phones has not been particularly strong and instead consumers have preferred branded smart phones,'' he said. ''People have gone to branded devices. The brand is not just the brand any more. It comes with an ecosystem.''