Samsung takes on Apple with new tablet

Samsung Electronics is beefing up its tablet range with a competitor to Apple's iPad Mini that sports a pen for writing on the screen.

The Korean company announced on Sunday in Barcelona, Spainthat the Galaxy Note 8.0 will have an eight-inch screen, putting it very close in size to Apple's tablet, which launched in November with a 7.9-inch screen.

It's not the first time Samsung has made a tablet that's in the Mini's size range: its very first iPad competitor had a seven-inch screen, and it still makes a tablet of that size, but without a pen.

Samsung will start selling the new tablet in the April to June period, ata currently undetermined price.

It made the announcement ahead of Mobile World Congress, the wireless industry's annual trade show, which starts Monday in Barcelona, Spain.

The Note 8.0 fills a gap in Samsung's line-up of pen-equipped devices. It falls between the Galaxy Note II smartphone, with its 5.5-inch screen, and the Galaxy Note 10.1, a full-size tablet.

Samsung has made the pen called the stylus one of the tools it uses to chip away at Apple's dominance in both tablets and high-end smartphones. Apple doesn't make any devices that work with a stylus, preferring to optimize its interfaces for fingers, mice and touchpads.

On Samsung's Note line, the pens can be used to write, highlight and draw.