The Long-Term Tablet War

So far, many have tried, but none have succeeded, in gaining significant share versus Apple in the tablet market.  Today, Amazon officially announced its tablet competitor to the Apple iPad - called the Kindle Fire, which has a 7-inch screen and sells for $200.  The $200 price tag seems to be its number one feature since storage is limited, the OS is an older version of Android, and there is no built-in 3g.  On the plus side, the Amazon skin on top of Android looks great, and so does the integration with Amazon video and music streaming and storage services.  Plus, lots of Android apps work on the device.

Others have taken different approaches.  Here's a summary of market activity in 2011:

• Samsung produced the Galaxy Tab II, which is a spectacular performer, but is stylistically too similar to the iPad.  Apple is suing to prevent its sale in most places around the world and, so far, is mostly winning.
• RIM released the Playbook, which is tied to the Blackberry.  You have to have a Blackberry to access mail. contacts, and your calendar.  Since more people are dumping Blackberries than buying them, this feature was unpopular.  Any day now, a new version of the RIM QNX operating system will come out that fixes this, but, in the meantime, it's like betting you'll win an NFL title with a 40 year-old Brett Favre at quarterback.  Who would do that? Oh, wait....
• HP released the TouchPad only seconds before deciding to spin-out its PC business and exit the tablet business.  Then, with over 200,000 unsold TouchPads lingering in warehouses and a sales channel with pitchforks marching on the castle, it put them on sale for $99 and sold a ton of them.  This was one sweet tablet - fast, intuitive, easy-to-use.  It's just that it had almost no apps beyond the ones that came with it.  All I can say is, it coulda been a contendah.  
• Motorola released the Xoom, which included wifi and 3g, but, if you wanted 4g connectivity, you had to send it back to them for a week for retrofitting.  People hug their tablets close almost every minute of every day like a firstborn child.  Who is going to send their child to camp at such a tender age - even if a free genetic upgrade comes bundled with the camp package?  Nobody knows what will happen when Motorola morphs into Googorola (in actions if not name).
• Asus, Acer, Lenovo, HTC, Vizio, and Toshiba have all weighed in with nice tablets that bring little differentiation to the market.  USB ports, HDMI, SD card slots - the iPad has none of those, and people don't care.  They really don't want their tablets connected to anything except for iTunes to sync - until iCloud comes out in a few weeks or months.
• Sony just launched to tablets that are fatter on one end than the other, feel incredibly comfortable in the hand, and have a software layer on top of Android that make using the tablet much easier.  It shows some promise, but I am not sure you can buy one yet. Time will tell whether the Sony approach creates a PHAT tablet or just a fat tablet.

You would think that, with so many new choices, sales would surge for several companies beyond Apple; however, the cash register has yet to ring for anyone but Apple.  Gartner believes that trend will continue for a very long time.  Here's what all the wannabes -  all huge names in computing and electronics - are missing that Apple has built:

• A truly integrated, simple approach to OS and applications software.
• A learning curve that takes an hour or less.
• A single huge marketplace for all things tablet.
• A cloud-based service that connects all devices easily with little or no technical knowledge required - if iCloud lives up to its promises.  MobileMe didn't.  Google has all these services, but connectivity can be curiously complicated.
• A brand against which all competitors are compared (and fail by comparison).  There can really only be one of these until someone flips the board.

Google had enabled many companies to get in the phone and tablet game. They have provided tools that enable each hardware manufacturer and carrier to create something different and unique.  They have provided Android for free, so that handset makers don't incur licensing fees, because they know that search and ad revenues will more than make up for Android's upfront costs. In the phone market, this has driven Android to a market leading position - great for Google - but 10+ handset makers sell Android phones.  It's likely only a few - Samsung, HTC, and Motorola, in particular - are big winners.  This approach hasn't translated to tablet sales, because users want a completely integrated experience on tablets.  Many consumer and business users have shifted their app use to tablets over the last year - at least on the iOS platform.  Android will continue to get better. Android tablet market share will rise on the tablet side, but frustratingly slowly.

So, who will challenge Apple's tablet dominance?  Their old nemesis, Microsoft, which is taking a marathon runner's approach to phone and tablet market share growth.  They have tens of billions in cash to invest.  They have Nokia as a huge global partner, which has bet its business and hopes for return to market share dominance on Microsoft.  And, somehow, the Nokia alliance hasn't scared away other handset makers that currently bet the ranch on Android.  All the biggies, except for Motorola, will be releasing Windows 7.5 phones.

Most importantly, Microsoft is highly motivated.  The Company wants and NEEDs to unify all these different devices - PC, phone, and tablet - to preserve their Windows, Office, and server software revenue streams.  Plus, making Bing and other cloud services profitable and successful, too, would be hugely helpful.  Having people running the show who have been through epic wars with well-armed competitors provides valuable lessons, too.

The initial reviews are good.  See the CNet roundup of all things Windows Phone 7.5 here:

• Windows Phone 7.5 is integrated experience especially for social networkers and heavy e-mail users.  
• Windows 8, which comes out next year, will be a unified experience on the PC, phones, and tablets.  
• Microsoft's online services seem to work much more easily on mobile devices than on the web, which is kind of weird.  
• Microsoft is taking a soft and nurturing approach to seeding the market - paying the best developers to write for their apps and targeting top influencers like Scott Adams of Dilbert fame and Molly Wood (here and here) of CNet, who, despite their best efforts, had good things to say about the new OS.  Note that Molly hasn't given up Android yet, but she said the phone was a good fit for people who were heavily tied to Microsoft services.

Right now, Google has the spotlight as the tablet challenger.  24 or 36 months from now, Mr. Gates and Mr. Ballmer may be taking the lead.