Another likely iPad Mini killer has surfaced straight from where the hugely popular iOS tablet is assembled - in China.

Xiaomi, known for its affordable but beautifully-crafted smartphones, plans to expand its presence into the tablet market and the company figured that the best way to easily attract attention is offer a familiar looking device.

And true enough, the Xiaomi MiPad can be readily mistaken as the iPad Mini, which to date is considered as the Rockstar that owns the compact tablet stage. Except that the device is encased in plastic as compared to the aluminium-wrapped Apple slate, which goes for both the first iPad Mini and the Retina-toting Mini 2.

The similarity between the iPad Mini and the MiPad is skin deep, according to BGR, with the tech site also noting that "the MiPad packs quite a punch and could become a very interesting option to tablet buyers looking for monster power at an affordable price."

The MiPad boasts of a 7.9-inch screen profile that obviously is very iPad Mini-like, packing too a 2048 x 1535 screen resolution with the user interface trying to convince would be buyers that the Android tab is the closest they can get to the iOS experience without abandoning the Google mobile platform.

Under the hood, the powerhouse is NVIDIA's beastly quad-core Tegra K1 processing chip that hums away at top-speed of 2.2GHz with complete ease. The same chip is tapped to 2GB of RAM that assures users of speedy and efficient mobile computing experience.

The rest of the specs are the following: an 8MP rear and 5MP front camera combo, up to 64GB of internal memory with support for storage extension through a microSD card slot and a massive 6700mAh battery.

The above powerful components, Xiaomi said, are framed inside a shell that is only 8.5mm thick with the device ending up to a net weight of mere 360grams.

Xiaomi is not too shy on admitting the obvious - that the MiPad is unabashedly an iPad Mini knock off, though it asserts a very worthy Apple device clone.

"We wanted the hardware to come close to, or even surpass Apple's iPad," Xiaomi chief Lei Jun told Reuters during the MiPad's recent launch in Beijing, China.

Lei also explained that Xiaomi devices may remind of the products from major players like Apple and Samsung but the business approach that the company operates on is very different - the core focus is the delivery of mobile related services that reminds of the Google business model.

The best part about the Xiaomi MiPad is its accessibility, which according to The Verge will carry an introductory price of $240 for the 16GB model.

Release date for the MiPad is not yet specified by Xiaomi though the tablet could arrive at around the same time that the iPad Mini 3 will debut, which is rumoured to take place between October and November 2014.