Quote:
Originally Posted by frahse
Sometimes the news is that the story doesn't change which usually means that the strategy is working.
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But in this case there *is* a change: instead of tying to promote use of their services by building premium tablets they've turned away from the high end and moved way down market.
The message *I* get is they see a train wreck coming to Premium Android tablets and they're trying to stay out of the way of the wreckage.
This is not the first indicator out there of impending disaster for that segment: I look around and I see the Surface 3 at $499 and the Asus T100 CHI running $279-300 and a bit lower I see the ZenPad C at $199. The first two are premium convertible computers (of which there's a slew in the $400-500 space) and the latter a high spec Android tablet.
And then I see B&N trying to sell high-end Samsungs at $399.
By now, every time I see B&N go in one direction on Hardware I expect the market to run in the opposite direction.
The tablet bubble is just about ready to pop and while Apple will always sell because it is Apple and WinTabs will sell because they're computers, Android has a tougher row to hoe. Their message has to be price.
I think that anybody looking for a premium Android tablet should wait if they can. By next march, if not sooner, a lot of those $400 tablets are going to be moving at $250 or lower. If they're moving at all.
If I'm right, by this time next year "Premium Android" will be an oxymoron when it comes to tablets.