Saturday, February 25, 2012

Three iPads?

I hardly believe this rumor about a three-iPad lineup soon, but I would love it to be true. That way there could be a cheap entry-level model for kids and others, a normal model (maybe close to the current iPad 2), and a super-model for the enthusiasts with super-high-rez screen and the works, at a premium price.
Making everybody happy at a single price point (only varied by over-charging for more memory) is not so easy.

3 comments:

Stephen A said...

In the long run it will be a necessity, but it may not be enough.

Apple is trapped in a low end disruption situation. Cheap tablets are rapidly becoming "good enough" and costs are dropping. Amazon and B&N are both deliberately driving prices down. On the high end Samsung and Asus among others are producing comparable tech at lower cost. Android tablets are already running 4 core processors on the top of the line as well as 1080p screens. Samsung may well announce a retina type display based quad core tablet this week.

If Apple simply ups their specs on the iPad3 they risk overshoot, in which the capabilities exceed the needs of most users. As a result a three prong strategy similar to the iPod (Touch,Classic,Shuffle) will staunch the bleeding.

Unfortunately it will reduce the huge margins as well. Apple's business model is dependent on huge margins to provide the design/R&D budget necessary to go it alone on hardware and software versus the pooled resources of the Android producers. Finally, it would dilute the iPad's status as a Veblen Good.

The other problem is that despite the increasing popularity of 7" tablets, he risks going against Steve Jobs' shibboleth against them.

I'd be happy with it in that I'd get to slap senseless any fanboi who utters the word "fragmentation" ever again!

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Well, a monopoly is bad for consumers.

Though I guess a non-monopoly can be as bad if everybody is competing only on price.

But I think we'll have a healthy market.

TC [Girl] said...

I hardly believe this rumor about a three-iPad lineup soon, but I would love it to be true.

It seems more possible, today, Eo.

(damn these near-decipherble double captchas!)