I don't understand why Android tablet manufacturers are failing

[Doboji]

They've had 2 years now to get it right... everyone and their mom knows the keys to victory are UI fluidity, physical platform, and the screen. Yet here we are a week from iPad stomping on Android's face. I just don't get it.

And I hate Apple... I'm a huge Android fan...

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

They've had 2 years now to get it right... everyone and their mom knows the keys to victory are UI fluidity, physical platform, and the screen. Yet here we are a week from iPad stomping on Android's face. I just don't get it.

And I hate Apple... I'm a huge Android fan...

I think part of the problem was the fact that iOS just had more hardware acceleration of UI than Android, up until ICS.

 

[dguy6789]

Marketing, consumer perception, and price. For a competing tablet to succeed vs the iPad it must do one of the following:

1. If it is anywhere near the price of an iPad, it has to be extremely obvious within 10 seconds or so of playing with it/looking at it why it's better than an iPad to a completely uninformed consumer. So far none of the manufacturers seem to understand this.

2. It must be significantly cheaper than the iPad.

 

[Dari]

The main problem is that, while Apple can subsidize the price of an iPad via selling software in iTunes, Android manufacturers are stuck with only selling hardware. Hence, they have to maximize profit from only hardware and not from services such as software or other things. That is why their products are the same or more expensive than an iPad while usually offering less.

 

[QueBert]

iPad wins here because you can do so much more with it. Android tablets are oversized toys. With iPads you're nowhere near as limited. My neighbor uses an iPad in his studio, has an XLR studio mic dock hooked up and even runs a Bass guitar to it. He replaced a $1200 piece of dedicated studio equipment with it. And the iPad actually does more. Even though it's technically doing something it wasn't even designed or meant to do. Go to any B&M electronics store and see the shit you can buy for an iPad and look at the section for Android. I'm not talking cases and screen protectors, I'm talking shit like what my neighbor bought. It cost him about $350 iirc, which is more than a lot of Android tablets run. But it turns his 2 year old iPad 1 into something completely beyond what a tablet is.

Now him using an iPad to product music in a studio is obviously only going to account for a fraction of a percent of owners, but the fact you can do shit like that, and so much else makes it more appealing to the masses.

 

[dguy6789]

iPad wins here because you can do so much more with it

wat? From a purely objective standpoint, Android tablets have had more functionality than the iPad from the very start, even the bad ones it just goes with the the massive feature gap there is between Android and iOS.

 

[Red Storm]

They're failing to grab mainstream appeal. That has nothing to do with features, as I still can't - for example - expand the storage in an iPad, nor can I use it as a simple USB storage device. For those who care, Android's tablet market share will likely increase overall for the year. It happened despite the iPad 2, and I think it's a pretty safe bet that it will continue even with the iPad 3 launch.

 

[alent1234]

The main problem is that, while Apple can subsidize the price of an iPad via selling software in iTunes, Android manufacturers are stuck with only selling hardware. Hence, they have to maximize profit from only hardware and not from services such as software or other things. That is why their products are the same or more expensive than an iPad while usually offering less.

itunes doesn't make near as much money as the hardware. it's close to break even. look at the numbers yourself

truth is google screwed up. first there was honeycomb which is now history. now there is ICS but there are no devices for it and going by past numbers it won't peak until 2013.

i have a droid for work and had a HTC phone last year. the screen is bigger but the android market sucks compared to app store. the apps are worse and less useful apps. most new apps are on iOS first. games are better on iOS.

most people don't care about widgets, live wallpaper or launcher pro or rooting

 

[ChronoReverse]

Not peripheral wise actually. With the standardized connector, it's simply much easier to do things like what QueBert described with an iPad.

 

[QueBert]

wat? From a purely objective standpoint, Android tablets have had more functionality than the iPad from the very start, even the bad ones it just goes with the the massive feature gap there is between Android and iOS.

My neighbor and the majority of the public are not XDA techie nerds. They don't know what rooting or CM7 are, so they don't care. iOS out the box is much more usable for the average joe. iOS also has much higher quality apps, and it just feels better. Android fanboys will argue that Android's all around better, but for my neighbor and my step mom it's really not. You could bring up the feature gap, but they care about the user experience, at at this point Android Tablets just don't offer anything close to what iOS does. My step mom doesn't give 2 shits about features if a product does what she wants. She's not a fan of Apple but she loves her iPad and wouldn't trade it for the world. And again, what I brought up isn't possible with any Android tablet. I mean if he wants my neighbor can power his legit studio off an iPad. Android doesn't even have a half way decent app to do anything in a studio, never mind the fact he's running studio mics, guitars and midi keyboards to his. None of that is possible with Android, and probably never will be

 

[Dari]

itunes doesn't make near as much money as the hardware. it's close to break even. look at the numbers yourself

truth is google screwed up. first there was honeycomb which is now history. now there is ICS but there are no devices for it and going by past numbers it won't peak until 2013.

i have a droid for work and had a HTC phone last year. the screen is bigger but the android market sucks compared to app store. the apps are worse and less useful apps. most new apps are on iOS first. games are better on iOS.

most people don't care about widgets, live wallpaper or launcher pro or rooting

Where?

 

[alent1234]

the apple financial releases

http://investor.apple.com/

like every other US public company they release financial statements every quarter and annually.

another reason is that the android makers except for samsung have these small production runs and every phone is different hardware. this is why apple's profit margins are so high, they use the same parts across their devices.

and there is no nonsense of apps like netflix or skype taking months to get "certified" on a phone

 

[Dulanic]

Very simple... Apple managed to get tablet to be synonymous with Ipad. In most people's minds a tablet is a ipad period. How this happened? Well Google didn't put any work towards tablets at first then they tried to patch together a tablet OS using phone software.

ICS corrects these things, but they are way behind in the game now. It's unfortunate, but they can only blame themselves.

BTW Apple doesn't subsidize hardware prices on the ipad2... they make tons of money off them.

 

[alent1234]

it also didn't help that the first android tablets were tied to carrier data plan contracts

i still remember the nvidia ceo speech from CES 2010 where he said you now buy computer from the verizon store. the ipad 2 launch ended that theory

 

[micrometers]

outside of the geek subset, the only reason people go with android is because apple isn't available. you know that the iPhone was ATT only for like 4 years, right?

 

[Dari]

the apple financial releases

http://investor.apple.com/

like every other US public company they release financial statements every quarter and annually.

another reason is that the android makers except for samsung have these small production runs and every phone is different hardware. this is why apple's profit margins are so high, they use the same parts across their devices.

and there is no nonsense of apps like netflix or skype taking months to get "certified" on a phone

Care to show me specifically where the revenue and cost for iTunes are? You made the claim. Please back it up.

 

[pm]

First off, there are lots of Android tablets being sold... in the form of the Kindle Fire.

The problem from my perspective is price. HP showed you could get people to line up for a tablet not made by Apple - you just need to price it low enough.

I have an Asus Transformer - now running ICS. And I have a first gen iPad. And to be honest, I like them both well enough. But if I had to pick, I'd keep the iPad. There's generally more software for the iPad. I can cite lots of specific examples, like my daughter is studying for the Colorado State Geography Bee and there's really no good apps on Android for the Geo Bee. Meanwhile there's 3+ really high quality ones on the iPad. And, yeah, geography bee studying programs are a bit far from mainstream usage, but there's more. My younger daughter is learning to tell time - better apps for that on iPad. For learning/practicing algebra - iPad is better. My wife is learning French and last I checked for intermediate level French, the iPad apps were way better. So, from my non-rooting, non-custom ROM, when I look at which device we use more at home, it's the iPad.

On the phone front, I switched to Android and I don't think I'll go back to the iPhone, but for tablets, I think my Asus Transformer is headed to Ebay. We don't need two of them and they iPad gets used more.

My issue with Android tablets is that they are priced too close to parity with iPads meanwhile the iPad has better advertising, better name recognition, and more apps.

From my perspective, what Android needs to do in the tablet space is come up with a seamless user experience, price it cheap, they'll sell lots of them and the apps will follow. Like the Kindle Fire.

 

[Spoooon]

Is the contest to beat Apple at marketshare or to beat Apple at quality hardware? As long as there is enough of a market that Android draws similar apps and there are Android tablets that you like, who cares? As long as Samsung makes money, they'll continue to make Galaxy Tabs.

And as redstorm said, market share will likely increase for Android anyway.

 

[micrometers]

I honestly thought that android stood a better chance in the tablet sphere. It appears that they customized the UI for the larger space, while the iPad is basically a big iPod touch and the UI is more or less the same as it was.

 

[Phokus]

They've had 2 years now to get it right... everyone and their mom knows the keys to victory are UI fluidity, physical platform, and the screen. Yet here we are a week from iPad stomping on Android's face. I just don't get it.

And I hate Apple... I'm a huge Android fan...

ICS hasn't been out that long you know.

 

[alent1234]

Care to show me specifically where the revenue and cost for iTunes are? You made the claim. Please back it up.

in the 10-Q and 10-k
$6.3 billion in revenue for the segment that includes itunes for 2011 and $2.4 billion in the latest quarter

they don't give you the exact expenses but for 2011 they had $10.5 billion in SG&A and R&D. $3.5 billion or so in the latest quarter

when you add up all the expenses for the new data centers, icloud and the operating expenses they are breaking even or running a small profit on itunes

 

[senseamp]

I guess it depends what you want to do.
For me, it's email, web browsing, reading ebooks, and tethered navigation, so my $150 CM7 Touchpad does the job. Could $500 iPad do those better? Let's see, $350 more, no Flash (if you don't care, fine, I do), and no free Navigation app. So in my case, iPad would not be replacing thousands of dollars of studio equipment, it would be replacing a $150 device with a $500 one with less of the functionality that I want.

 

[Red Storm]

From what I remember:

A year ago, Apple had ~68% of the tablet market.

In January, they were at ~58%.

In the same time frame, Android went from ~28% to ~38%.

The tablet market is still fairly new. To me it seems like Android is grabbing market share at a pretty good rate. If they were to overtake Apple, I think it would take 3 years. Maybe 2, but I don't think we'll see an exact mirroring of the smart phone market.

 

[poofyhairguy]

I don’t think the Android tablet market has outright failed. On the contrary when you consider the fact that it is obvious Google started on tablet sometime around when the iPad launched it is amazing ICS is where it is.

The reason the iPad is a success is because Apple used its marketing savvy to re-define the tablet market. In the past MS sold a future of full-feature computers in a tablet form-factor and that dream failed because mouse-driven interfaces do poorly with touch screen.

With the iPad, Apple sells a low-feature computer (in comparison to a Windows PC) that does touch extremely well. People get amazed about what DOES work with the iPad, instead of bitching that their printer, USB accessory, or paid-for Windows programs didn’t work. This is a luxury OSX was never given, nor any single serious Windows competitor until the iPad.

The problem for Android is that in that move Apple set the new standard to be the iPad. That means until the functionality is near the iPad for many people it is not as useful (look at PM’s post).

I think the future for Android to be competitive in the tablet space is to go in another direction and erode at the things a real Windows PC can do. Already Android has nice mouse support, and things like a Transformer add a keyboard. Keep going with that- better printer support through CUPS, put together a working USB accessory list, and better remote desktop software (I can’t wait to try Splashtop THD).

 

[Dari]

in the 10-Q and 10-k
$6.3 billion in revenue for the segment that includes itunes for 2011 and $2.4 billion in the latest quarter

they don't give you the exact expenses but for 2011 they had $10.5 billion in SG&A and R&D. $3.5 billion or so in the latest quarter

when you add up all the expenses for the new data centers, icloud and the operating expenses they are breaking even or running a small profit on itunes

Yeah but they're not building a new data center every year and, as someone else mentioned, their R&D is spread over many devices since they essentially use the same parts. My point still stand that iTunes gives them an advantage whereas other manufacturers only have the hardware to sell. I should also add economies of scale as well...