The war between Microsoft and Apple enters a new battle
The new Apple tablet development is the worst kept secret in the business world. Many had expected that the product would be introduced this holiday season but as Mr Jobs takes over design and feature development the product, it is expected, has been moved back to early 2010 thus missing the key holiday season. New iMac's and Macbook designs are in the works and expected anytime soon but with the average PC price around $500 and the average Mac price around $1100 cash strapped consumers are more likely to stay with Windows and PC's.
The HP Pavillion laptop is a great PC for $549
An Apple VP recently
said that he thought of the launch of Windows 7 as an
opportunity for Apple to pick up market share and
probably some people will make the move to the Mac
but my guess is that the percentage of people
upgrading hardware to a Mac will be very small
perhaps in single digits as percentage of switchers.
Of course this is just fine for Apple because their
strategy has always been to sell fewer computers but
ensure that they make more money on each sale. One
can't argue with the results either as Apple has a
lot of cash on hand while Dell struggles to make ends
meet.
Apple users can make a case that ownership of the Mac
costs less than ownership of a Windows PC and Apple
does give you several free programs plus Mac's don't
need virus protection like Windows PC's but the
reality is that sticker shock will send a lot of
people to HP and other PC makers for hardware
upgrades.
So the key question remains can Apple pull a product
winner with the new tablet next year and how many
people will be willing to buy one? Apple will of
course sell a lot of them, their are Apple zealots
who would purchase a rock if it had an Apple logo on
it but will the product go mainstream? Hard to
say..the Microsoft tablet video
is
already circulating on the Web and it looks damn
good. People are willing to pay money for
technology that makes their lives easier but when
the price starts to climb there is a trade off.
Apple will continue to make a lot of money for the
company and it's shareholders but let's be honest
they are not a mainstream product company. They could
care less about market share as long as they make
money and right now they are making a hell of a lot
of money.
