News
Mix: Gartner, Apple suit, iOS 4.3.2, Schmidt at Apple
Research firm Gartner has released its latest forecasts for tablet sales through 2015, which predict that Apple will still hold a 47.1 percent of the market in 2015, on sales of over 135 million iPads. “Seeing the response from both consumers and enterprises to the iPad, many vendors are trying to compete by first delivering on hardware and then trying to leverage the platform ecosystem,” said Carolina Milanesi, research vice president at Gartner. “Many, however, are making the same mistake that was made in the first response wave to the iPhone, as they are prioritizing hardware features over applications, services and overall user experience. Tablets will be much more dependent on the latter than smartphones have been, and the sooner vendors realize that the better chance they have to compete head-to-head with Apple.”
Apple has won a preliminary round in its ongoing lawsuit against companies manufacturing and/or selling unauthorized accessories for the iPod, iPhone, and iPad. Ars Technica reports that U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel has denied a request from four of the companies to have the case dismissed on procedural grounds, ordering the suit to proceed. Apple sued Eforcity Corporation, Accstation, Itrimming, Everydaysource, United Integral, Crazyondigital, and Boxware Corporation last July, claiming that the companies violated as many as 10 of Apple’s patents and additional trademarks by selling unauthorized electronic accessories, including chargers, speakers, and cables. “Many are of inferior quality and reliability, raising significant concerns over compatibility with and damage to Apple’s products,” the company said at the time.
Boy Genius Report, citing an Apple source, has claimed that iOS 4.3.2 is due in “the next week or so,” and will deal with several issues, namely problems experienced by Verizon iPad 2 owners unable to connect to 3G, FaceTime issues, and security fixes. While BGR’s record on predicting Apple iOS update releases is mixed, Apple has confirmed that it is aware of the Verizon iPad 2 troubles, saying, “We are aware that a small number of iPad 2 customers have experienced connectivity issues with the Verizon 3G network and we are investigating it.”
According to In The Plex, a new book about Google penned by technology writer Steven Levy, Apple hid the development of the iPad from then-current Apple Board member and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt. As reported by the Daily Mail, the book claims that Apple CEO Steve Jobs was so enraged after seeing iPhone features such as pinch-and-zoom being implemented in Android after a visit to Google’s Mountain View campus that he hid the iPad’s development from Schmidt. Schmidt resigned from Apple’s Board of Directors in August 2009; the iPad was unveiled roughly six months later.
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1
“they are prioritizing hardware features over applications, services and overall user experience”
This is what seems to be lost on almost every other mobile device that comes to market. Android, WinMobile 7 and most others (and their hardware partners…I have no personal knowledge of HP/WebOS yet…) want to find one way to best Apple. They key in on some hardware (a larger screen, better speakers, better camera) or software (Flash, “true” multitasking, widgets) feature and tout that they are better. The fact is, that one feature “may” be better than the corresponding feature on the iDevice. But the overall user experience is still lacking. Apple is great at tying it all in and making it feel seamless. Some have called it “dumbing down”, but I call it simplifying.
Posted by Mitch on April 13, 2011 at 10:03 AM (PDT)
2
Everyone should know by now that software sells hardware. Not the other way around. I have a feeling lots of companies will be learning that the hard way.
Posted by VULTR3 on April 13, 2011 at 10:16 AM (PDT)
3
“Everyone should know by now that software sells hardware.”
You would think this is the case, but apparently not everyone has grokked this yet. Of course, maybe Apple feels this lesson deeper in their marrow than others having watched a roughly 1/3rd market share in PCs drop to 3% and stay there for over 15 years because they didn’t get the memo when Windows started to really become dominant. They sat on the sidelines refusing to license Mac OS insistent their OS was good enough on its own to sell overpriced hardware and reaped the consequences. Without consumer software, once the tide of consumer perception turns against you there is very little you can do: you don’t have the consumer numbers or resources to attract and/or pay developers, and without developers, you can never grow your consumer numbers. It’s a chicken & egg conundrum you can’t escape from past a certain point.
It’s still early enough for others to address things, but I think their principle handicap is that the OS comes from Google, who has shown very little interest in creating a developer environment that can push Android/Honeycomb to a critical mass situation. Given that there have been Windows tablet computers for a decade and they’ve done nothing (to the point most aren’t even aware they exist), this is Apple’s race to lose.
Posted by Code Monkey in Midstate New York on April 14, 2011 at 5:21 AM (PDT)