Yet another report indicates Apple’s iPad beats the pack of Android tablets until at least 2015. More polished and less expensive alternatives could cut Cupertino’s comfortable marketshare by more than a third, new research finds.
“Apple’s edge is likely to wane as the quality of the competing products and application environments improves,” says David McQueen, principal analyst at Informa Telecoms & Media. Apple’s current 75 percent of the tablet marketshare is expected to shrink to just 39 percent as Android-based tablets improve. Indeed, Apple will sell 90 million units versus Android’s 87 million in 2015, according to the researcher.
McQueen said low-cost tablets, such as those rumored from Kindle-maker Amazon, coupled with an improved OS should increase consumer appeal. Other devices based on various operating systems, including Windows, RIM’s QnX, and HP’s WebOS, will also shrink Apple’s current tablet lead, contends McQueen.
The numbers mirror earlier Gartner projections that Apple’s current tablet marketshare will fall below 50 percent by 2015.
Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.
12 responses to “The iPad Will Kick Android Tablets’ Teeth In Until 2015 [Report]”
I thInk that the ipad will always be the most popular tablet like the iphone is but ios might not always be the popular platform. But who knows what will happen
By the time Android catch iPad, Apple will have another new product that other company will have to copy and catch again…
Yep. All his comments about quality improvements seem like he thinks the ipad etc are not going to improve also
Yeah, this will happen, just like Apple lost share of the MP3 player market to other, cheaper devices … oh, wait; that never did happen, did it?
People keep talking about specs and hardware, it’s always the content that is king. iPads/Iphones are leaders not because of the hardware but the strong eco-system apple built with iTunes, thousands of apps and a solid OS with a developers community….hard to unseat…even by 2015 I don’t see it. When the original iPod came out, many tried to beat it and no one did because of the eco-system. Unless someone changes their game and really focus on the content…I don’t see it happen…ever.
The only exception and one who has a chance is Amazon. They already have the content, if they figure out the rest they stand a good chance of taking a piece of Apple’s share.
I agree, just like the zune knocked 30% market share away from iPod! … yes… just like that… um….