“There have been plenty of hints that Hewlett-Packard’s TouchPad isn’t selling well,” Arik Hesseldahl reports for AllThingsD. “First there was a $50 discount. Then there were spot discounts of $100 at outlets like Costco. Then the $100 discount became permanent. Adding insult to apparent injury, a deal on Woot for $120 off an entry-level 16-GB TouchPad netted all of 612 takers.”
“With HP set to report quarterly earnings tomorrow, sources familiar with the matter tell AllThingsD that TouchPad sales are failing yet another critical test: Sales at big box consumer electronics retailer Best Buy,” Hesseldahl reports. “According to one source who’s seen internal HP reports, Best Buy has taken delivery of 270,000 TouchPads and has so far managed to sell only 25,000, or less than 10 percent of the units in its inventory.”
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Hesseldahl reports, “A second person who has seen Best Buy’s TouchPad sales figures confirmed the results as “consistent with what I’ve seen,” and went so far as to say that 25,000 sold might be “charitable.” This source suggested that the 25,000-unit sales number may not account for units that consumers return to stores for a refund. Best Buy, sources tell us, is so unhappy that it has told HP it’s unwilling to pay for all the TouchPads it has taking up expensive space in its stores and warehouses and wants HP to take them back.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: You want a device to fail? Put webOS in it.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Jarvis” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
As Apple iPads sell like hotcakes, mountains of unsold tablets pile up in channel – August 15, 2011
People don’t want fake iPads, they want real Apple iPads; HP slashes TouchPad dud by 20% – August 12, 2011
HP TouchPad hits Australia with a resounding ‘meh’ – July 27, 2011
HP bumps Rubinstein from webOS lead after TouchPad launch failure – July 11, 2011
Rubinstein addresses poor HP TouchPad reviews, compares webOS to Apple’s early Mac OS X – July 5, 2011
HP fiddles while Apple innovates – July 10, 2011
Rubinstein addresses poor HP TouchPad reviews, compares webOS to Apple’s early Mac OS X – July 5, 2011
HP TouchPad simply cannot compete with Apple’s iPad 2 – July 5, 2011
Pogue reviews HP TouchPad: ‘Doesn’t come close’ to Apple’s iPad – June 30, 2011
Mossberg: HP TouchPad ‘simply no match’ for Apple iPad 2 – June 30, 2011
Better than number one!
I actually think WebOS is a pretty darn good mobile operating system. If I didn’t have the luxury of using iOS, I’d find myself using WebOS long before using Android…
I agree that I’d also choose webOS over Android any day of the week, but the HP TouchPad has proven to be nothing less than a spectacular fail. When they can only move 612 of them in 24 hours on Woot! despite cutting $120 off the retail price, that’s about all the proof that is needed. These things will either end up being cut to $249 or less by Thanksgiving, or else tens of thousands of them will end up in a landfill somewhere outside of HP’s headquarters as a tax write off.
This is just further proof that there is NOT a tablet market out there to be had, there is simply an iPad market.
I’ll be waiting for them to show up at Factory Direct here in Toronto. It won’t be too long I figure as retailers look to recoup some losses and just dump the stock to get it out of their warehouses. The 16GB WiFi unit at somewhere around $149-$199, which is undoubtedly where they will be or Factory Direct won’t bother with them as they have refurbed iPads for $399, wouldn’t be a bad score at all…
I agree. WebOS is actually good. In fact, it does many things better than iOS (which thankfully are for the most part being addressed by iOS5).
I tried the TouchPad at Best Buy, but the problem, at least at this BB, was that you couldn’t actually use the thing. All you could do was play several videos about what you could do. I tried to quit the video app and go to the home screen or whatever, but no luck…
Unfortunately, you *could* try the Xoom. Wow, that thing is slow; I can’t believe it made it through QA.
It would appear Jon Rubenstein may have indeed been a mole for Apple after all.
Rubenstein, Jon Rubenstein.
WOOT!WOOT!
25,000 units. Perhaps 6 hours of iPad 2 sales. Raging success…
No way Jose!!!
Best Buy doesn’t want the “Number 1 plus”??? No body wants a “number 1+” tablet???
Let’s join the CEOs from Microsoft, HP, Dell, Palm (ex Ed Zandler), Motorola and Acer and make a circus.
“Cirque Du Fail”
For the longest time HP has been run by unimaginative bureaucrats fixated on the bottom line. Make it as cheap as possible seems to be their motto. Customer service is abysmal to say the least. Is there any wonder that HP has fallen off the cliff with the TouchPad.
@HTML5 Gordon
Great name
Cue pressure from HP leading to some VP from Best Buy saying ” We love the TouchPad “, or some such nonsense.
It seems that most people familiar with Web OS agree that it is better than Android. Perhaps, then, HP might want to resurrect the platform by giving it to other hardware makers. Since Google is now going vertical and competing with other phone makers head-on, HP might capitalise on the situation by licensing Web OS (for a discount, compared to Win 7 Mob).
You mean the mediocre printer company who bought Palm and slapped together some off the shelf parts is having a problem competing with the company who has been secretly working on a mobile OS for nearly 15 years?
The sad thing is fandroids and critics of APPL think they came out with iOS in 2007. In actuality they have been working on it since the Newton was killed off.
And these mediocre razor-thin margin computer manufacturing with no history of OS (let alone lightweight sturdy mobile OS) capability companies think they can jump into a race, (be competitive and some even more delusional, think they can win) that was started over 12 years ago. And yet their speed out of the gate is 25 mph while APPL was already going 200+. Not only will they not catch-up, they are being lapped even while their foot is on the gas.
What APPL replicated was the soul of their computing philosophy into a mobile device that liberated the mass public from the tyranny of mediocre and sloppy device/mobile OS makers. APPL dropped the bomb with the iPhone/iOS, (and now iPad) and the would-be and slain competitors are scrambling to do what they took for granted before, sales. They are learning what true competition looks like from a company that actually cares enough about their product to spend all their effort on one device/computer per year of each line, a laser-focus most of the ADHD tech builders will never possess. While the rest of the community throws everything and the kitchen sink at the wall to see what sticks. They have no vision, other than massive quantities of multiple products at razor-thin margin.
When you stand for nothing, you will fall for anything. APPL’s commitment to ONE product and implement with a perfect balance of all design/software aesthetics is mocked by the tech community. When you build one right, what’s the need for a massive library of others? It makes no sense financially, competitively or ethically.
That is the sad tale of APPL’s competitors. The tale only gets worse when iCloud comes out, it will be the finally nail in the coffin. APPL is so far ahead of the game, in fact it is their game to lose. Now that most covet the iPhone, they are going to show us that with iCloud that devices are irrelevant, and it is about how devices interact with out lifestyle and habits. This is APPL’s end game, the paradigm shift to mobile/Cloud world, where your data/content is the only important thing. Devices, computers, phones will always be replaced or updated, what makes any of those things useful is what is on them, when you need it.
What he said ^^^
No for real though, well said sir.
thank you… just a casual observation of the reality that the non-apple tech community faces.
@rhetoric.assassin: You mean the mediocre printer company who bought Palm and slapped together some off the shelf parts is having a problem competing with the company who has been secretly working on a mobile OS for nearly 15 years?
The sad thing is fandroids and critics of APPL think they came out with iOS in 2007. In actuality they have been working on it since the Newton was killed off.
Tut, tut rhetoric.assassin. You are being too polite and generous.
HP today is also the result of the 2002 acquisition of Compaq which, you may recall, enjoyed a position of dominance in the PDA market with their iPaq range. These of course, ran WinCE… as did their own HP PDAs of that era. In other words, HP does have long experience of creating and marketing PDAs. And it has developed a habit of acquiring competitors in the belief that they can do better managed the HP way… Also possibly because they see the need to break away from M$.
Consider also that on the HP Board sits a certain Mr Andreessen. You know the guy… he’s the co-founder of Andreessen Horowitz, co-founder and Chairman of Ning, a director of eBay, ex-Chairman of Opsware, ex-Chief Technology Officer of America Online. Oh, and co-founder of Netscape Communications Corporation…
So this is the HP that has produced the TouchPad.
Well, what went wrong? Why is the TouchPad, the pinnacle of their achievements, a direct result of all this talent, experience and intellectual property, why is it a dud?
I think it is a matter of focus: a highly diversified corporation (that is primarily targeting enterprise) up against a narrowly focussed and agile game-changer that is out to create, then target and satisfy consumer demand.
HP lives in interesting times…
Twenty four hours later and HP has just found its focus:
Enterprise IT
What a change in direction to walk away from Consumer IT…
Great post, rhetoric assassin! Very well written, with lots of good points.
@rhetoric.assassin, nicely said.
thank you.. i will be sure to repost it when it is appropriate.
So this was their Worst Buy?
I have a Touchpad here at work. It sucks pretty royally. Screen scrolling is choppy as hell and there are no apps to speak of. Try scrolling a web page and it makes me nauseous. The camera is only for video conferencing. Two people here tried to just take a picture of themselves with it but it doesnt have a built in photo/camera app and no one could figure it out!!?!?!?! The wireless charging pad is a joke. I had it on the charger the entire work day and the batteries were only 60% charged. The case feels cheap. The home button is shaped ALL WRONG and is hard to hit since it does not have the slight little depression that the ipad has. The buttons feel cheep like they are going to break. It really takes a manual to learn the ins and outs of how to use the OS. Im glad I didnt have to pay for this. But I must say, it is a step up for HP from thier HP 500 slate. Oh poor HP, nice try.
Ouch. That’s bad.