According to a report from Taiwanese’s tech site Digitimes; the fans of Apple’s iPad tablet can look forward to a version of the device with a small screen size — 7.85 inch tablet, to be exact — in the fourth quarter of 2012, along with a new version of the popular tablet iPad 3 in the first quarter of the New Year.

The display panels of this iPad 4 that Digitimes says Apple is considering will be coming from a few companies, including LG Display and AU Optronics (AUO). The move is reportedly aimed at heading off the challenge from the similarly compact, Android-powered Amazon Kindle Fire and Barnes & Noble’s Nook Tablet in the Christmas market.

Although there are multiple sources that have claimed the coming launch of this never-before-seen model, the “mini-iPad” still hasn’t been confirmed by Apple, because of the very nature of the device. Apple would have to “re-resolution” its user interface once again for a screen size in between the 4-inch iPhone models and the 9.7-inch iPad models.