Lets be clear. PCs are not iPads. iPads are not PCs. iPads are not TVs. TVs are not iPads. Smartphones are not iPads. iPads are not smartphones.
So why do people get them confused? Simply they assume one is canabilzing the other so they are the same. I’ve yet to meet a single person, A SINGLE PERSON, that doesn’t have a PC running somewhere. Many are planning to upgrade or change their PC. Truth is, I would expect to see PCs and iPads roughly equal in shipments.
Funny thing is, I’ve chatted to plenty of people that watch and read more on their iPad and as a result aren’t investing in new TVs, home phones, books etc. That seems too hard to analyze and talk about so the PC gets a good lod fashioned analyst bashing.
They are wrong. PC are sales aren’t suffering as a result of the iPad. They are suffering because of:
- Lousy design innovation
- Poor customer experience
- Lousy connectivity and networking
- The Microsoft / Intel duopoly funding the industry has come unstuck
- Neither Microsoft or Intel have sufficiently innovated
- Lack of new and compelling apps driving upgrades
Where this isn’t happening – PC gaming for instance — the market is vibrant. I’m banking on the PC industry waking up, throwing out a generation of product line management that got it wrong and blazing a new path. That might be asking too much.
