Where iPad competitors went wrong
It wasn’t long after the iPad launched competition seemed to be coming from just about everywhere. They all pretty much had the same idea, lets make a tablet similar to the iPad and price it about the same.
By the time the competition hit the market, Apple had released the iPad 2. The Motorala Zoom, Blackberry PlayBook and HP’s TouchPad were released based on the original iPad. Although, Samsung redesigned the hardware that they were planning on using for the Galaxy Tab after seeing the iPad 2, opting for a slimmer design.
The iPad wasn’t the first tablet ever made, here is what tablets looked like before the iPad.
Here’s a photo of tablets after the iPad was released.
There’s little doubt that these companies were trying to replicate the iPad’s design, along with the success.
iPad Competition Having little Success
The HP TouchPad has seen the most sales on all non-iPad tablets over the last few days. This comes after the company announced plans to discontinue the device and drop the price to $99. Before the huge price drop the TouchPad was not selling and BestBuy was on the verge of asking HP to take the tablets off the shelves.
While HP is the first to scrap their tablet plans, the rest are having little success selling their devices as well.
Samsung is giving away their tablets with the purchase of a big screen TV in a promotion to help move the devices.
Motorola shipped a mere 440,000 Xoom tablets in the last quarter and RIM shipped 500,000 PlayBooks in the first quarter since the release of their tablet.
It’s About the Software
While the iPad hardware may be easy to replicate, the software and the iTunes ecosystem is not. Apple has the largest App Store in the world. There’s currently over 100,000 apps designed specifically for the iPad and over 400,000 apps for the iPhone.
Android has the second largest App Store with over 200,000 applications but only a few hundred designed for tablets. Rim and HP only has a few hundred apps for their tablets as well.
Apple’s iOS software, along with the strong developer support for the iPad makes it difficult for the competition to have success in the market.
Where does the competition go from here?
Judging from the TouchPad sales over the weekend, there is a market for inexpensive tablets. Tablet manufactures may find some success if they can make a decent tablet in the $149 to $299 range. If the get close to $499, many people are going to opt for the iPad.
Innovate. That means not following or copying Apple and not relying on Google to innovate for you with Android.
Who has the best shot?
That’s anyones guess but Amazon is expected to release a tablet this fall that could challenge the iPad and Google’s acquisition of Motorola Mobility will give the internet leader control of hardware and software.
Originally posted 2011-08-21 23:09:32.