Tablet war: the old vs. the new breed

Tablet war: the old vs. the new breed

It's a no secret that the tablet world is currently ruled by the likes of iPad and Galaxy tab in spite of their exorbitant costs. At the same time many other tablets with similar configuration and features struggled to gain even a noteworthy share in the global tablet market. This unusual phenomenon reveals the fact that consumers are following popular tablet brands and not exceptional products.

Three of the above mentioned tablets successfully carved a niche for themselves through their pumped up advertising and marketing activities. These tablet biggies exploited their respective brand names to the fullest. They created strong presence and recall value in the tablet market, and also entered the tablet market in its nascent stages to create a strong foothold.

However, the duration of this success is uncertain as customers have begun to question as to how feasible is it to buy a tablet that costs equivalent to a mid segment laptop? Lately customers are also coming to terms with the fact that their basic computing needs such as internet surfing, instant messaging and playing multimedia files can and should be met a cheaper price. The question is which device can offer the features of a tablet at an affordable and reasonable price? The answer is - a tablet that belongs to the new breed of affordable tablets.

Reasonably priced tablets that fall under the price range of $100-$250 are the ones that belong to the new breed of tablets. To cite a couple of examples of tablets that belongs to the new breed: the recently unveiled Kindle fire by Amazon and ViewSonic gTablet by ViewSonic. Kindle fire, ViewSonic gTablet and many other launched or to be launched tablets from big & small technology companies claim to deliver computing experience a little below or at par with the older breed of tablets, but only for a fraction of cost of the tablets that are currently available in the market.

Factors such as reducing costs of tablet related hardware & software and the narrowing chances of creation of a game changing tablet related technology are bound to make the old and new breed of tablets to compete in the market on a sole criterion- Pricing.

Findings from a recent independent survey reveal that most respondents who do not own a tablet device are less concerned about the brand of the tablet and are more concerned about the capability of the device. It wouldn't be completely wrong to state that this set of respondents may represent a larger segment of the society that would buy a tablet-like device only if it’s priced around $200.

According to me, one key difference in the offering between the old and the new breed of tablets would be the user experience. And although factors like brand loyalty towards renowned brands and their existing dominance in the tablet market may act as an impediment to the process of mushrooming of cheaper tablets, this new breed of tablet is bound to bite off a significant chunk of the global tablet market.

Image modified | Original image courtesy: twobee