BlackBerry maker, Research In Motion, has announced to roll out its own tablet by the end of this year to give tough competition to Apple, which has sold over a million devices within days of launch in the US and its iPhone set to overtake BlackBerry throughout the world.

RIM has not given any information about its upcoming tablet, but bloggers said that the tablet would be 8.9 inches and expected to hit markets by December 2010.

It will be the first non-hand-held device from the Canadian company, based at Waterloo near Toronto, which is confronting a tough challenge in the overcrowded smart phone market.

The tablet from RIM without mobile networking will link to its smart phone devices via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.

There are also rumors that Hewlett Packard is also making plans to introduce its own HP Hurricane tablet, based on the Palm OS software, later in the year.

At present, both RIM and HP are analyzing the iPad to consider what they can add to their product so that it can attract more and more users.

According to reports, the new touch-screen tablet will be bigger than a smart phone but smaller than a laptop computer.

Moreover, it will turn out to be a new game-changer in internet browsing, gaming, e-reading and content creation and management.

Weighing just 1.5 pounds, the new touch-screen tablet will come with amazing battery life of nearly 10 hours.

It also gives users access to Apple's app store - the world's biggest - with more than 200,000 applications. After its launch in the US April 3, the iPad will hit nine more markets - Canada, Britain, Germany, Australia, France, Italy, Spain, Switzerland and Japan - May 28. (With Inputs from Agencies)