An image of Samsung's Galaxy Note tablet PC is projected on the big screen at a launch in New York on Thursday.

Samsung Electronics on Thursday launched a new tablet PC, the Galaxy Note 10.1, in Korea, the U.S. and the U.K. As the name indicates, the gadget is a tablet PC version of the company's hit Galaxy Note smartphone, which comes with a small stylus called the S Pen.

Samsung is apparently trying to exploit the popularity of the phone to boost its poor performance in the tablet PC market. It sold more than 10 million Galaxy Note smartphones in the nine months since it rolled it out last October.

About 200 American journalists and consumers were invited to a launch event at the Time Warner Center in Manhattan. Celebrities including Baz Luhrmann, the director of "Romeo and Juliet" and "Moulin Rouge," and fashion designer Zac Posen, endorsed the gadget.

Samsung executive director Lee Young-hee emphasized the "creativity" of the tablet PC, saying, "The Galaxy Note 10.1 is neither a smartphone nor a tablet PC, but a product of quite a new concept Samsung Electronics has created."

Samsung "decided to launch the new gadget in New York due to the city's symbolic nature as the heart of Apple's powerbase," a spokesman said.