“Apple has already won – and that’s even before the product hits the Asia Pacific countries, in many of which it has only today been made available for sale,” Evans writes. “As expected, hundreds of customers queued across the territory to be among the first to get hold of the netbook-killing iPad. Successful launch across the region is only going to drive iPad sales higher — component suppliers are already unable to keep up with Apple’s demand. Supplies of flash memory and displays are particularly affected.”
Evans writes, “This is why Apple has won the battle for tablet computing already, killing those nascent ‘iPad-killers’ (with the possible exception of the spookily similar products from Samsung, which also makes components) before they even get born. After all — you can have the best product design on the tablet sitting on your factory floor, but it means nothing if you can’t get the components you need.”
Read more in the full article here.
I thought I read this yesterday…
“After all — you can have the best product design on the tablet sitting on your factory floor, but it means nothing if you can’t get the components you need.”
There’s no evidence that any of the aspiring “iPad killers” has best product design”, or even design “good enough” to compete against Apple’s offerings. The writer is, like Consumer Reports in their iPad review, simply imagining that there’s something better out there if we just wait long enough.
So, they can’t get the balance of the ingredients of their iTurdTablet killer to chrome plate the thing. If you don’t chrome plate that turd tablet, the consumer is going to smell it and just walk away.
The devil is in the software. On any related device, nothing comes close to Apple’s OS X.
On the hardware side, the tight availability of screens for both the phone and pad until 2Q 2011 is problematic on many levels. How this impacts Apple’s holiday season remains to be seen.
Check out the Darth Vader on Antennagate cartoon at the end of the article. Love the part about vaporizing AT&T.
“After all — you can have the best product design on the tablet sitting on your factory floor…”
Well there is the problem with the competition. The product is supposed to be made from the product design – not just lay on top of it.
That has been the problem, all those companies like Microsoft, trying to get all those best parts together and working to create a iPad killer. They have had ten years to get those parts off the floor and into a product that works. Yet, not one has done it with thousands of companies!
All those best of parts seem to have been assembled by Apple and other companies are looking down at those parts with fear. Their engineers with a schematic of the iPad and an order just to get anything out then door by years end or else.
Those Lovely Parts…..
@Raymond in DC
I don’t think for one moment that Jonny Evans thinks that there actually is a better tablet close to going into production ( outside of Cupertino of course ), but he is simply making the point that without plentiful and affordable supplies of the vital components, there is no chance that a rival could get into mass production.
The writer is a well known journalist who has written about Macs for many years. Even the tag line to his picture in the article refers to him as an “Apple Holic”, so I think it’s highly inappropriate to put him into the same category as CR.
The point of his article was to explain why there is little chance of an iPad killer coming along any day soon. A rival would have to match a sophisticated and complex array of features that Apple has already established in the market place. It’s not just the hardware or the software, it’s the eco system, the App store, the economies of scale, the quality control, the word of mouth, the ultra low power consumption and the aesthetics.
It wouldn’t be enough for a rival to cherry pick half a dozen iPad features and make something that can pretend to equal them. Any rival has got to match or exceed all of the iPad’s features, sell for no more and still make a profit. That’s a very tall order indeed and the fact that so many previously announced slate’s have now been abandoned shows that the manufacturers realise that it’s a formidable challenge.
Apple can thank Bill Gates for planting the seed, and then not watering it for a decade! That built up interest, so that when Apple dropped to iPad… well the rest is history!
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Apple didn’t kill the iPad killers, because there aren’t any. Apple finally made a tablet the way it should have been, not just some small form PC. That’s the difference. No one else can possibly compete (HP may be able to field a WebOS unit, but it won’t compete), because no one has anything clos to the iOS and the App Store.
@ Dave – We did!
This news is so yesterday!
The contrived comments at the end of the source article are fascinating: Snakes trying to wriggle out of their old skin, hoping the new skin will be different. Good luck with that.
Game. Set. Match.
It has been three years since the appearance of the first iPhone, and Apple’s so-called competitors are still struggling to come up with competing products that even come close. Based on this pathetic performance, the iPad should remain the king of tablet computers for years to come.
Apple can thank Bill Gates for planting the seed, and then not watering it for a decade! —HUTA
Baloney! Apple started working on the Newton in 1987. Steve Jobs says, “We don’t need no stinking Bill Gates!”
@Alansky
… and don’t forget all those “iPod killers” too.
It’s nearly ten years since the first iPod was released and how many other brands of MP3 player could Joe public name ?
Plenty of big names have tried, some have wasted a fortune doing so, but none have dented the iPod’s dominance.
You might imagine that having seen what happened with iPods, then the iPhone, manufacturers might see some sort of pattern that is likely to repeat with the iPad, but they refuse to see it.
how diificult is it for these guys to figure it out. IPod won because it had ITunes. Iphone not challenged because of the quality of IOS but most importantly the app store. Now comes IPad, a tablet design competitors have been eyeing for over 10 years but they can’t figure out what to do with it. Steve Jobs and Apple come in with IOS, the app store, itunes, ebooks, video streaming, gaming, iphoto, iwork and vala make a market for the IPAD. The box makers can’t compete with that and never will. Google knows what Steve is doing with the mole on the board and they’re trying but Apple is so integrated with their products and google is just beta software. Just can’t wait for AppleTV subscription model. Watch only what you want for $25 a month.
If the competition thinks it has it tough now, just wait until iPad-2!
I don’t think component suppliers are going to have any trouble meeting the demand of slate makers.
@alansky
Thank you for saying it first.