IPad Rivals? There Are No iPad Rivals.

January 19, 2011 at 7:50 am PT

If one were to portion out the tablet market as it exists today, one might allot a segment to Apple, another to Google, one to Microsoft and, soon, another to Hewlett-Packard’s Palm.

If Apple COO Tim Cook were to portion it out, he’d divide it in two–iPad and Not-iPad– and it wouldn’t be an equitable division. Asked during Tuesday’s Apple earnings call for his thoughts on the horde of tablets unveiled at CES and now hurtling their way to market, Cook summarily dismissed them all.

“If you look at what’s shipping today, there’s really not much out there,” he said. “Generally speaking, there’s two kind of groups that are on the market today. The ones that are using Windows-based operating system, are generally fairly big and heavy and expensive, have very weak battery life, and require a keyboard or a stylus as an input device. And from our point of view and what we’ve seen, consumers aren’t really interested in them.

Then you have the Android tablets which are running an operating system that wasn’t really designed for a tablet. Google has said this, and so this is not just an Apple view by any means. And so basically, you wind up with a sort of a scaled-up smartphone, which is a bizarre product in our view. So frankly speaking, if a customer does a side-by-side comparison of one of these with an iPad it’s hard for me to understand why they wouldn’t select the iPad.…There are no rival tablets in the market right now that we’re concerned about. The next-generation Android tablets aren’t shipping yet, and so today, they’re vapor. We’ll assess them as they come out.”

And continue to innovate in the market.

Said Cook, “We’re not sitting still. And we have a huge first-mover advantage. And we have an incredible user experience from iTunes to the App Store, and an enormous number of apps and a huge ecosystem. We’re very, very confident with entering into a fight with anyone.”

And with an 87.4 percent share of the worldwide “media” tablet market, according to IDC, who wouldn’t be?

[Image credit: Gizmodo commenter Ahubbuch]

Tagged with: Android, App Store, Apple, apps, CES, digital, earnings, ecosystem, hardware, Hewlett-Packard, HP, IDC, innovation, Internet, iPad, iTunes, John Paczkowski, market, Palm, PlayBook, rival, smartphone, tablet, Tim Cook, Windows

comments so far. Add yours.

http://www.sitereviewboard.com/ Elton Sites

There is not much of a difference between an android smartphone and an android tablet except that you can make a call on a smartphone. The same goes with the iPhone and the iPad.
Anonymous

Let’s brace for the “the iPad is doomed, Android tablets are all better” comments…
Anonymous

He’s absolutely right. Apple got there first with a really good product and now everybody else is trying to play catch-up. Like I’ve said before, most of the tablets that were shown at CES this year will never go into production, just like the many of the ones that were shown last year. CES has turned into a place where companies show prototypes to try and garner interest, but most of the stuff turns into vaporware.
Anonymous

I thought the most interesting comment Tim Cook made on this topic was his observation that you need to be a system administrator to use Android devices.

What Google calls ‘open’ is the same thing that Apple calls ‘fragmented.’ There are multiple hardware designs from different vendors each trying to differentiate from the others. There are multiple versions of the Android OS that are inconsistently updated if at all. There are even multiple Android App stores run by different vendors and not all carrying the same software. You need to be a system administrator to sort all of this out.

When all of your devices connect to iTunes there is a very high degree of automation (backups, syncing, app updating) that doesn’t require the user to make nearly so many decisions or be so knowledgeable.
Anonymous

“…and it wouldn’t be an equitable division.”

You expect a market to be divided equitably. Based on the needs of the suppliers perhaps? How hard they worked, or perhaps level of improvement since their previous model.

I suggest you read “Atlas shrugged”, and then come back and appologise.
Chris

In John’s defense, I didn’t sense in his tone that he “expected” an equitable division. He simply pointed out that it would not be so.
Chris

Tim Cook’s point is that Apple reworked the UI for iPad. It’s not the same iPhone. Whereas, all of the current Android tablets simply use the phone operating system.
Anonymous

Tim Cook merely states the obvious. there is iPad, and then there is everything else. And isn’t worried. That is what the author meant by “it would not be an equitable division.” There was no political or economic theory involved in that statement.
Anonymous

In Object Orientation we call the hiding of details ‘encapsulation’ which is basically making the use of a software object like the using of the Apple iPad extremely easy and friendly. Using an Android, although much easier than a Blackberry Curve, is anything but encapsulated. Apple has engineered to perfection in making the using of an iPad an extraordinarily easy and superbly useful experience. This encapsulation of the iPad functionalities which is consistent throughout all 300000+ iPad apps, is an insurmountable lead that iPad holds over all the competition, soon to be universal for all Pad form factors and usage standard. You can see clearly that although webOs, Android, Rim OS, and recently the Windows P7 and Rim Playbook OS all strive to copy Apple’s looks and feels, anything beyond those cute little icons will reveal worlds of differences that deviate significantly and confuse people to no ends. Rim machines are very very very limited and their usages markedly differ even between Blackberrys models. Android usages are just as confusing. webOS is another way to deal with. Windows P7 is introducing another totally different way. Application developers cannot deal with so much chaos. Having so many fundamental differentiations make their jobs just absolutely impossible.

This is the reason why iPhone and iPad are the mainstay for mobility. Anyone can pick up a iPad or iPhone and immediately be an expert. There are 300000 apps which all behave using the same Apple usage methods, no headaches, no surprises.

The only problem is Apple is not producing enough iPhones to meet hundreds of millions in instant demands. These disappointed people who can’t get an iPhone 4 have a nasty habit of blaming Apple and often take their frustrations on Apple unjustly.

iPad brings not only a well known and consistent set of usage methods from iPhone, but an extraordinarily large screen that is extremely lightweight and much more useful using the much needed extra screen estate and very long battery life. Surely as expected, the iPad is now the most valuable property on earth desired by just everybody.

The new MacBook Air goes one-up on the iPad offering a superset of minicomputer like computing prowess that challenge the myriads of computer servers in form and style. Equipped with new found powers from the iPad, the MacBook Air is the foremost device for all kinds of purposes all packaged in a 2 pound unitized metal body yearning to be unleashed like the Star Trek USS Enterpise, to boldly go where no man has ever gone before.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_47XHGLZVO6IUYLMWVUYFVN5LQU Dr No

Note who didn’t get mentioned either in this article, or by Tim Cook during the conference call. I bet RIM fanboys are seething that they have been made so irrelevant so quickly in the mobile market.
Anonymous

The iPad is definitely the best tablet on the market right now, but then again, it doesn’t have much to compete with. In about 2 months though, we will start to see some real contenders come to the fight. I think the best shot comes from the BlackBerry PlayBook. It surely won’t sell as many as the iPad, but once compared side by side even with the iPad 2, I think a lot of consumers and tech bloggers will place the PlayBook on top.
Anonymous

No, you are wrong.

iOS runs native C apps, like a Mac, Windows, Linux, or Unix PC. Many iPad apps are ports from PC’s, like Keynote and OmniFocus. Although iPad can run iPhone apps, most users don’t do that very often, they run full-size made-for-iPad PC class apps. iPad has a 10 inch screen, also like a PC. iPad has a full-size browser view, also like a PC. So iPad users find that their iPad takes over 75% or more of their PC use. It’s a mobile PC, not a mobile phone. In Apple’s lineup, you have iPhone and iPod touch on one hand, and iPad and MacBook Air on the other. iPad is a small PC, not a big phone.

A Samsung Galaxy Tab runs Java apps, like a phone (excluding iPhone), and even worse, 99.9% of them were built for a 4 inch screen, they are literally phone apps. The Galaxy Tab browser shows a small view of the Web scaled up by 1.5 times, not a full-size Web view. Galaxy Tab has a 7 inch screen, unlike any PC. (Even the original 1984 Mac had a 9 inch screen.) Galaxy Tab is not a mobile PC. It’s a 7-inch phone.
Anonymous

The iTunes ecosystem is already a little more I-T work than most people can handle. That’s why there are Genius Bars at Apple Store. People take their iPods in there to get a few minutes of help. So what non-Apple phone, music player, and PC makers are saying to users is not just give up your Apple device, but also give up iTunes and Genius Bar. It’s like saying give up your chauffeured taxi for a big rig that takes weeks to learn how to drive, including a day just to learn the air brakes. The excuse the non-Apple vendors make is the same old nerd bigotry: hey, if you want to get around, you ought to learn how air brakes work! The really foolish part is they want to charge the user more money than Apple, too!
Anonymous

That is a good joke, but in reality, one of the main defenses of Android is it has many vendors and therefore deserves a larger market share than single-source iOS.
Anonymous

RIM does not make tablets. That is the only thing that makes them irrelevant to this discussion.
Anonymous

You could have written this exact comment in June of 2010 and it would be just as accurate. After all, tablets are easy: mobile hardware, big multitouch screen, PC class operating system ported to mobile hardware, PC class application platform ported to multitouch. That grows on trees. Microsoft just announced they will have all that ready in as little as 2 Microsoft years, which is only 5 real years. It should be even easier for everyone else since they are starting from scratch, right? I mean, look how easy it was for other companies to outdo iPod: 10 years later, Apple’s market share is down to 75%.
Anonymous

Cook had singled out the vapor Android tablets worthy of mentioning. To me, Rim is on life support and the Taiwanese Quanta Playbook is not the silver bullet for curing Rim’s apparently terminal diseases.
Anonymous

Top of the list of iPad clones are the Galaxy and the Xoom. HP Palm tablet is a big dark horse. Quanta Playbook can come in no better than 15th place behind a field of knock-them-dead gorgeous powerful beauties that would melt the snow on your front lawn.
Anonymous

Thanks, Chris.
Anonymous

And thanks to you as well. Nice to see you folks watching my back in the comments.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=603628952 Gabe Lyte

Better price? iPhones and high end Android phones end up costing the same over the duration of a 2 year contract.
Also isn’t a walled garden generally more secure?
http://www.facebook.com/people/Steffen-Jobbs/100001574843303 Steffen Jobbs

Sweet!. You “schooled” him well. Tim Cook and Steve Jobs would be proud of you. Me, too.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Steffen-Jobbs/100001574843303 Steffen Jobbs

My only question is: What does a company that has a $60 billion cash reserve actually have to worry about.
Anonymous

My opinion about apple:ipad and google:android tablets is the same to most people. Both have weak spots, and they will grow in 2011. For apple users, you have to endure Software inflexibility, Fewer hardware choices, Productivity limitations. Some one insist jailbreaking it for software inflexibility, but I think if you can solve the problems via apps provided in itunes and mas, you’d better keep it without jailbreak.
As video is a very important part of media informations, when you embarrassed by them for the limitations of video supporting, ifunia video converter and dvd ripper maybe a good choice to you.
The Beginner’s Guide to iPad Video Conversion on Mac:
http://www.ifunia.com/articles.....n-mac.html
http://www.facebook.com/rus.bufton Rus Bufton

Exactly. At the end of the day, choice is good. Many people will choose the iPad, both now and in the future, but the more variety of tablets out there is good. Apple, HP, Samsung and the rest all have devices either out or on the horizon.

As for the Android bashing, it’s a little unfair. From what I’ve seen, Android 3.0 looks like a great piece of software, as does HP’s latest version of webOS.

IPad Rivals? There Are No iPad Rivals.

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