Apple Inc., trying to expand beyond the Macintosh, iPod and iPhone, introduced a tablet computer with a touch screen.

The iPad can display full Web pages and has a touch-screen keyboard that’s almost full size, Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs said today at a company event in San Francisco.

Mr Jobs described the tablet as a “third category” between smartphones and laptops.

The device, which looks like a large iPhone, can be used to watch films, store photos and browse the web.

Mr Jobs told an audience of journalists, analysts and industry peers that the device lets people “hold the whole web in your hands”.

Jobs, 54, has spent the past decade transforming the maker of the Mac personal computer into a consumer-electronics juggernaut. The iPad builds on the digital media and mobile technology behind Apple’s market-leading iPod players and the iPhone, and will challenge dedicated e-book readers from Amazon.com Inc. and Sony Corp.

Apple could sell as many as 4 million tablets this year, Katy Huberty, an analyst with Morgan Stanley, told investors earlier this week. Toni Sacconaghi, at Sanford C. Bernstein & Co., predicted sales of 3 million devices in the first year, based on a selling price of $750.

Other analysts are aiming higher.

Demand for Apple’s traditional iPod music players is falling as consumers switch to multifunction devices like the iPod Touch, which has Wi-Fi support, and smartphones that can also play music and video, like the iPhone. IPod shipments fell 8 percent last quarter to 21 million units. Sales of the iPod Touch rose 55 percent.

With the tablet, Apple gets a new category built around its iTunes software and store. That gives the company a fresh way to attract consumers, video-game makers and other application developers, as well as publishers looking to capitalize on their content.

(Sources: Bloomberg / BBC / NY Times)