My big takeaway last week, when
Apple launched the iPad Pro, was this: Apple just admitted Bill Gates was right
and Steve Jobs was wrong. You see, years ago Steve Jobs went on about how the
early Windows tablet, which was designed for work and had a stylus, was stupid.
Steve was not a fan and pretty much dissed the entire tablet idea and then
again dissed the whole idea of a stylus when he launched the iPhone.
Well, Tim Cook effectively gave Jobs
a royal raspberry with the iPad Pro, which is basically the Apple version of
the Windows tablet. The thing is, though, that given the iPod evolved into a
small tablet, the iPhone is basically a small tablet with phone capability and
the iPad -- well it is the quintessential tablet -- Apple has been throwing
Jobs' initial position, that tablets were stupid, into the dumpster for some
time now.
The thing is, in developing the
initial Windows tablet, Microsoft simply didn't get what users wanted in a
tablet very well. Apple's success was based on better user focus, but
Microsoft's success with Surface Pro indicated there was an important part of
the tablet opportunity that Apple was missing -- and Apple just jumped on that.
In the end, this could make both companies' offerings far better over time.
I'll have more to share about that this week and
I'll close with my product of the week: the most underappreciated product that
Apple launched the iPad mini 4.  |
| iPad mini 4 |
A
Brief History of the Tablet
The tablet started out in the early
1990s -- long before the iPad or even the Windows tablet appeared -- as
something to replace paper. That was really the goal that Bill Gates was trying
to achieve when he came up with the slate form of the Windows tablet -- and it
has been successful where firms wanted to digitize forms. You needed a stylus
to fill out those forms.
Unfortunately, moving to a broad
audience didn't happen. Even Steve Jobs agreed that writing long notes and
documents using your finger or a stylus was going to be a nonstarter for most
folks, so after an initial spike in the early part of last decade, and again
after the launch of the iPad, people went back using mostly laptops for long
work.
What Jobs brought to the table was
the idea of a tablet for entertainment, and that worked impressively well.
While it actually was basically a big iPod, the iPad captured the imaginations
of many. Still, it had issues moving from entertainment to work, until certain
apps came onto the platform. Those apps allowed it to replace paper for forms
in healthcare, aviation, insurance and hospitality. The more the iPad moved
into business, however, the more the lack of a stylus hurt.
Microsoft came out with Surface to
address that opportunity, and it sold rather well -- even though it lacked a
fraction of the entertainment apps both iOS and Android enjoyed. The iPad fell
into decline, and a near-panicked Apple went back to the drawing board and created
the iPad Pro, which in many ways is basically Microsoft Surface Light.
That's largely because -- unlike the
MacBook Air and current stable of Microsoft offerings -- it doesn't run an
Intel processor. which locks it out of the massive number of legacy apps. Also,
ARM doesn't have the headroom yet for a strong virtualization or emulation
offering that could run Windows and might close that gap.
There are a number of tools that
allow Windows apps to run on Macs, but the processor headroom sharply limits
this option on iPads. One other shortcoming that may come back to bite the iPad
Pro is the lack of a trackpad. Folks used to laptops often find it faster and
easier to use the trackpad than the touchscreen -- not to mention it keeps the
screen from getting covered with fingerprints. Apple left a trackpad off its
keyboard, but I expect the aftermarket will fill that gap quickly.
Ideally, Apple needed a product that
was more like a Mac, but could run iPad apps on a tablet platform. It didn't
release that opting for a big iPad instead might have opened the door for
Surface Pro 4 running Windows 10, which potentially has far better support for
both Android and iOS apps collectively than either Apple or Google individually
does.
Surface
Pro 4
This is where I think things get
interesting, because we first saw Apple sign up IBM, and then Cisco, for this
opportunity. Then we saw Microsoft get Accenture and Dell to counter with a
number of other vendors ready and willing to sign up.
Microsoft knew that the iPad Pro was
coming. Much like it was designed to show well against the Surface Pro 3, the
Surface Pro 4 is designed to sell well against the iPad Pro. So expect
improvements in Surface Pro's keyboard, screen, battery life and appearance, as
Microsoft responds to this iPad threat.
Competition
Is Good
This should set up a tit-for-tat
competition between Apple and Microsoft for this class of product, which should
improve both products at an impressive rate. Until Apple entered the pro tablet
market, the likelihood that any of us were going to move to a tablet from our
PCs was relatively low. Microsoft was too focused on IT, and Apple too focused
on entertainment.
However, with IBM, Cisco and
Accenture in the mix -- not to mention Dell -- and Apple entering the segment,
the dual focus of IT and the user will become a competitive dynamic. In other
words, regardless of the , both Apple and Microsoft will increasingly agree on
one thing -- and that is that you need to live off your tablet.
If both companies continue to
improve at the expected blistering pace, those massive combined resources
should have a much larger number of us off laptops and onto pro-level tablets
from both vendors by the end of the decade.
Wrapping
Up
The important part of this isn't the
iPad Pro or Surface Pro -- it is that the competition between the two products
and aggregate partners should result in massive improvements in both offerings
that laptops likely won't be able to match.
The end result should be far better
products far more quickly, and that will increase the probability that we'll
all be on one of these things by decade's end. With tablet-like battery life
and weight coupled with laptop-like capability, I don't see that as a bad thing
-- not a bad thing at all.
Oh, and on the Bill is right and Jobs is wrong
thing. Bill had the concept right, but Apple got the execution right first and
made more money. Nadella, Microsoft's new CEO, and Cook, Apple's new CEO, now
get to show which one of them is smarter -- and that makes this really
interesting.
One of the things you learn pretty
quickly about all of the Apple "i" products is that they are all
variations of the iPod. The iPhone is an iPod with phone capability; the iPad
is a big iPod; and the iPad Pro is an even bigger iPod. If Apple had introduced
the rumored iTV, it would have been a humongous iPad.
What makes the iPad mini 4 attractive is that if
you don't really want an iPhone but want access to all of the apps, the iPad
mini is a nice alternative. You then can carry whatever other phone you like
and have a pretty decent blend of both the Apple phone platform and whatever
else you prefer (I'm on a Windows Phone or BlackBerry depending on the month).
The refresh of the iPad mini gave it
capabilities similar to the latest iPad. The price, for an Apple product, is
relatively reasonable -- and you end up with a better (bigger) screen than you
get on the iPhone 6s Plus.
A loaded iPhone 6s Plus, unlocked, will set you
back around US$900, and the iPad mini with 64 GB of memory is about half that
-- and therefore a deal. You get a nice cross between a tablet and an iPod that
is portable, and it won't break the bank. In effect, I think the best Apple
deal right now is the iPad mini 4. That's good enough to make the iPad mini 4
my product of the week. (Oh, and Steve Jobs was wrong about the iPad Mini too).
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