Apple: iPad Is Not Following Typical Early Adopter Curve

The iPad is a runaway hit and is going mainstream fast. CC-licensed photo by Mat Buchanan.

The iPad is a runaway hit and it’s going mainstream faster than anything they’ve seen, Apple execs are saying.

“It is not following a typical early adopter curve and taking a while to cross over into the mainstream,” said Apple COO Tim Cook during an analyst conference call.

Cook on Tuesday said Apple has sold 3.24 million iPads since its launch. The iPad is in the middle of an international rollout to 9 countries on July 23.

Cook said the company was caught off guard by demand, and is working to increase capacity.

“We thought capacity of 1 million iPad units per month was very bold,” he said. “Analysts thought we might sell 1 million units in the whole year.”

However, Cook says this is just the beginning — the tablet market in potentially huge.

“Our guts tell us this market is very big, and iPad is defining the market,” he said.

“We want to take full advantage of it, and so we are investing enormous time and resources in increasing our capability in getting iPad out to as many people as we can,” Cook added.

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Cook said half of the Fortune 100 companies are already deploying or testing the iPad. “It’s incredible,” Cook said.

“The demand has just been amazing and this is off to an incredible start,” added Apple’s CFO, Peter Oppenheimer.

16 comments »

About the author

Leander Kahney is the editor and publisher of Cult of Mac, and author of three books about technology culture: Inside Steve’s Brain, the New York Times bestseller about Steve Jobs; Cult of Mac; and Cult of iPod. Leander has written for Wired, MacWeek, Scientific American, and The Guardian in London. Follow Leander on Twitter @lkahney and Facebook.

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Posted in iPad, News |

Conrad
I wonder if this will finally stop the laboured cries of ‘FAIL’ from the folks over at Neowin.
pete
Not a chance.
IcyFog
The iPad is an amazing device. If my family didn’t hog it all the time, I would use it more.
Scott
Eh…only 256MB of RAM is insufficient…will be even more insufficient after iOS 4.0. Ill wait for the next model with 512+RAM, Retina or OLED Display, and Cameras.
Yargo
@ Scott
Agreed. I’m gonna wait for the next model also.
… to buy my 3rd iPad that is.
http://www.grinningidiot.com JAYnLA
I use mine constantly.
BMWTwisty
Watching CNBC around noon EST today, the three guys all had iPads they were using. You’re gonna start to see ‘em everywhere soon.
http://www.applesource.biz Perry
I got mine for free as a bonus from a client. I was very interested and really wanted one, but couldn’t really justify the cost. Now that I’ve had one for about a month, it’s clear that I’ll buy another one soon.
It’s way more useful than I ever imagined. So useful in fact, that when I’m not working on my Mac Pro, I’m fighting over the iPad with my girlfriend. We haven’t touched the MacBook Pro sitting on our book case even once.
Some work related tasks are actually more fun and productive on the iPad — I never really thought that would be the case.
I’m pretty sure at this point I’ll be selling my laptop and buying a couple more iPads before they all sell out holiday season. That way, we can keep one downstairs, and have two upstairs so we never have to fight over it again. =p
Not to mention, they’ll still cary a nice premium next April when Apple releases the iPad 2. I’ll be able to sell the three iPad 1s to pay for most of the cost of the iPad 2. Gotta love how Apple products maintain their value and “lust” factor even when they aren’t the “latest and greatest”.
http://www.applesource.biz Perry
My last line meant to read “sell the three iPad 1s to pay for most of the cost of the iPad 2s” — because I will be buying multiple iPad 2s!
iphonerulez
And the jackasses yelled “The iPad will FAIL” before it even went on sale. These people were the direct descendants of those that cried “The earth is flat.” What a bunch of retards.
David Fulero
I’m with scott, the iPad is pretty sweet but right now my iPhone 4 is actually WAY better. I’m going to wait till the next one
http://www.technovia.co.uk Ian Betteridge
@Scott: If they bring out another model this year (which is possible, in time for Christmas), while it may have more RAM it won’t have a Retina display.
Why? Two reasons. First, it would significantly reduce Apple’s margin on iPad, just as it’s reduced the margin on iPhone. Those things aren’t cheap, and making 9in versions of them would be proportionally more expensive.
Second, given that displays at this resolution are very new, and Apple is the only company to have them, it’s almost certain that supplies are constrained – it’s probably one of the reasons that Apple can’t ramp-up capacity on iPhone 4 faster. And given that Apple is already hitting its limits on supplying iPad, adding a part to it which would be likely to be even more constrained exactly when they need big supplies (Christmas) would be unwise.
charli
Actually Ian, I would say that they won’t be releasing a new one for Christmas. In part because to have the stock they would have to be making it now and with the limited resources going to meet the current ipad and iphone demand it’s unlikely they have anyone to make the ‘holiday’ line.
So next spring is probably when it will happen. And now that they see the demand is great they will be more inclined to do more ram, maybe more storage (or drop the 16 and lower the prices of the other two down a notch), built in camera(s) etc.
Mezzrow
The thing is, the OS was already mature when the iPad was launched, and there were already scads of developers making apps for the iPhone. The hardware was new, but I’ve never seen anything but stellar performance from mine…because Apple made sure it was a polished product. So I think that argues why the iPad can be considered to have passed the “early-adoption” phase. The iPhone paved the way, and lots of people are already comfortable with that.
http://www.freeapplezone.com Willipad
Nice glad to see the ipad doing well it’s an awesome piece of hardware.
http://link name
no comment.,