Every company has a hardware R&D department that once a console is launched, starts immediately on the next console.

At this point, its likely true they are having various chips made to test out a solution for an eventual product.

Nintendo is probably working on new hardware all the time, always, since the NES days, nonstop baby!

I'm pretty sure this is normal R&D.

I think they probably honestly already have a fully working "Nintendo tablet" inside their R&D.

Mobile chipsets are becoming ubiquitous in nature because so many vendors (from Apple to Samsung and back again) want them that it was probably fairly straight forward for Nintendo to take a look at what was available, select the vendor, and they'll probably tweak the chipset to their liking over the next year or so.

It would be significant though if they have finalized who the vendor is and approximately what type of chip they want. That would mean they are probably not far off from software development getting off the ground. 

This. R&D people are always working on some new cool stuff =D

Nintendo needs an adult Princess Peach game. Not in adult as in sexual, but more so a more naturalist look in a form of an action/adventure or a turned based rpg.

Meh....not sure how this is news. That's the way it's always been in the industry.

Nintendo should put a cheap console with games that appeal to all demographic groups and exceptional value.
Putting portable + console on the same hardware is a bad idea.

Hey Knee-jerk Ned.  'Platform', 'console', same thing.  I call handhelds consoles, too.  We're talking about the same thing here, it could be either type of hardware.

Some ideas have been formed, but most have not.  That's called brainstorming.  And they'll continue brainstorming until they've completely finalized the hardware within a year of launch.  Research & Development has two parts to it - 1.) Research, and 2.) Development.  That vendor information reflects the development phase of things.  What exactly is your argument?  

Virtual Boy 2 confirmed.