Following up on my post in April, Microsoft have announced that Windows 8 will be revised. The news is catching up with the views again, as many tech commentators have voiced their concerns since the launch of Windows 8 seven months ago. Hopefully the update form Microsoft will address consumer concerns about the ribbon interface, lack of a start button and desktop on boot up and hiding commonly used features under layers of the current interface.
Microsoft 8.1 will be named Microsoft Blue.
Read more: Here
By co-incidence today, my sister asked me to recommend a new laptop that had Windows 7 installed, instead of the less user friendly Windows 8 interface. Rather than suggesting she install this £50 copy of Windows 7; I may wait and see if Microsoft have been brave enough to admit their mistake and revert to a Windows 7 style user interface in Windows Blue. If not, the past will be the choice for the foreseeable future.
Some blues to accompany the Microsoft news:
Filed under: 2011 December | Leave a Comment
Tags: Microsoft, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Blue, Windwos
Grabbing headlines is still fairly easy for a CEO of a global top 250 company. You simply have to say something very provocative in the media. Sadly, this isn’t necessarily the same as saying something influential (e.g. providing thought leadership), career progressing, or even likely to be well informed.
Blackberry used to be a highly influential mobile phone manufacturer; particularly among business people. For more than a decade Blackberry (or RIM, as they were formerly known) supplied the go-to mobile phone with email device handed out to millions of managers around the world. It was a status symbol for some. But that was way back then, more than 5 years ago. And 5 years is a relevant frame of reference for this particular post.
Thorsten Heins, CEO of Blackberry has surprised people with his provocative prediction for the death of computer Tablets within 5 years.
At least the ‘death of Tablets’ has been the spin applied to what he said in some media reports. What he actually said was also, in my opinion, equally wrong; but possibly for very different reasons.
Before I go into what Thorsten Heins actually said, and why I believe this indicates why he is so out of touch that he will no longer be the CEO of Blackberry within the next 5 years. I’ll first demonstrate why I believe Tablets will still be around in 5 years.
My argument is that once a media communications channel becomes commonly available, it generally continues to be available for decades, if not centuries.
The chart below highlights this.
Media Forms Typically Last A Long Time
Apologies if the scale on this quick graphic isn’t quite clear. All of the media channels invented since the 20th Century CE/AD are all still present today.
While the Fax may soon go the way of the Telegraph, virtually disappearing only a century or two since widespread adoption; as other communication technologies more conveniently and cheaply replace their role. The Tablet is very much growing and morphing into different but related forms that are still identifiable as a tablet. From The iPad, to the Kindle, to the Samsung Note. The Tablet is neither in decline, nor likely to die out in the next five years.
Of course, the continuing rise in Tablet sales is not just my point of view. Gartner recently published information, based on actual sales data from 2012 and then their forecast to 2017. Sales are set to near double this year alone in their estimation to 197m units, then more than double again to nearly 468m units by 2017. Samsung Tablets, Amazon’s Kindle Fire and Apple iPad and iPad Mini quarterly sales reports also suggest confidence in Tablets outliving this decade.
Garner Data: Here
Garnet Device forecast 2012 to 2017
So what did Thorsten Heins, CEO Blackberry, actually say and what was he probably thinking?
In his Bloomberg interview Mr Heins said “In five years I don’t think there’ll be a reason to have a tablet anymore.”
He went on to qualify this by suggesting people will use a big screen in their workplace, but not a tablet.
This is the point that reveals how out of step he is with the consumer market place; but also reinforces his focus on the corporate customer for Blackberry.
If we rewind over the past five years; Blackberry have been focusing more on extending their products into the consumer market place. The introduction of the Blackberry Pearl (2006), the Blackberry Curve (2007+) signalled this in mobile devices. But the launch of the Playbook, a true Tablet, in 2o11 was Blackberry’s gamble to break out of smartphones and into the wider technology hardware space Apple and Samsung successfully operate within.
The Blackberry Playbook failed to attract a large enough share of the growing Tablet market (as did Motorola, Dell and HP; while Nokia scrapped their plans to launch a Tablet too). In part this was because the original Playbook device lacked key features. It required a Blackberry smartphone to pair with in order to access Blackberry email and calendar functions – the key reasons for owning a Blackberry device for many customers. The App store also struggled to offer a mere 25,000 apps after the first year from launch; leaving a poor comparison with the hundreds of thousands of apps available through Apple’s iStore or the Google Play app store for Android Devices.
Sales of the Blackberry Playbook stalled at around 700,000 in the first six months from launch, but after heavy price discounting total sales since launch in 2011 eventually edged up to 2.3m by Q1 2013 (source Wikipedia).
Before the discounting, unsold inventory made Blackberry take a loss in 2011 of $485m. The modest sales of Blackberry Playbook to-date compare unfavourably to the 34m sales of iPads sold in Q1 2013 alone for Apple, and 8.8m for Samsung, also in Q1 2013 (Source: International Business Times).
So, my belief is that what Thorsten Heins really meant to say was that while the Tablet market continues to grow, it is very small compared to mobile smartphones. And as Blackberry have failed to find either a consumer audience, or a sufficient corporate market, that demands our participation in the Tablet sector. Blackberry will stick to making smartphones, particularly for business users.
While new product launches, such as the recent Q10 smartphone, using Blackberry OS 10, adds a little newsworthiness back to Blackberry’s product range. The brand isn’t set for growth in volume sales or profits from my point of view. Particularly as the Q10 is priced significantly higher than the Samsung Galaxy S4, HTC One and the Apple iPhone 5.
My forecast is that Tablets will stay popular for decades to come, but I don’t believe Thorsten Heins will continue in his CEO role at Blackberry for the next 5 years.
Filed under: 2011 December | Leave a Comment
Tags: Apple, Balcberry CEO, Blackberry, Blackberry Playbook, Gartner, RIM, Samsung, Tablet, Tablets, Thorsten Heins
Anyone who has bought a new mobile phone, only to find out there was a problem with it, may sympathise with Apple’s woes on product quality. But whereas consumers may have a mixed reception when they try to return a faulty mobile. Apple’s iPhone manufacturing partner, Foxconn in China, appear to have been more flexible with their biggest customer.
Up to 8 million iPhones have been reported as returned by Apple to Foxconn, due to manufacturing or operational performance defects, or damage to the products during the manufacture process.
While this might on first consideration sound ruinous and a sign of poor quality control by Foxconn. The context point is that around 200 million iPhones have been sold since their original launch. So only around 4% of the products have proven inadequate. While not perfect, there have been occasions where mobile phones with a fail rate as high as 10% have been considered acceptable in the past. And the iPhone is a complex product and has arguably become even more fragile recently; given that iPhone 5′s case appears to attract, rather than resist scratches.
So while Foxconn are thought to have 8 million returns and the cost of replacement phones will see Foxconn write down around $1.6 billion. This is a cup of funds from a very large bucket.
Foxconn have been hiring 10,000 employees a week since March, as they gear up to manufacture the iPhone 5S for September launch.
Teb Crunch released an interesting data chart indicating that iPhone sales have rapidly outsold Apple Mac computers Clearly there is a huge price difference, with Apple Macs typically costing 2-6 times the amount of an iPhone. But the speed that iPhone sales have caught up and then exceeded Mac sales worldwide is still impressive
Read more about the Foxconn production issue on USwitch: HERE
Read more about the sales comparison between Apple iPhone and Mac at Tech Crunch: HERE
Filed under: 2011 December | Leave a Comment
Tags: Apple, Foxconn, iPhone, iPhone 5, iPhone 5S, Tech Crunch, TechCrunch, Uswitch
Next Xbox announced May 2013
Xbox May 2013
Filed under: 2007, June | Leave a Comment
Tags: Nexbox, Xbox, Xbox 360, Xbox 720
Someone important at Microsoft has realised that Windows 8 really isn’t what people want. So prepare for an update to Windows 8.1; this may just possibly be nearly be as good as Windows 7. Go figure.
When it launched in October 2012, I had to wonder if Windows 8 had been sponsored by joint funding from all the rival programmers who work on Apple OS, Linux and Google Chrome? As the Microsoft OS sure gave lot of people cause to consider switching to an alternative rather than stick with Microsoft.
What was particularly strange with Windows 8 was that it was optimised for touchscreen, but launched in the lengthiest recession in decades; when fewer businesses and consumers were interested in replacing laptops and desktop computers to take advantage of touchscreen. So the new Windows OS was optimised to perform best through functionality most users have never experienced even 6 months after launch. That’s thinking so far ahead of the curve, in hoping to meet a future demand, that its merit remains questionable. This primary benefit, that was meant to deliver modern sizzle to Windows, remains largely unused.
Windows 8 is also overtly consumer orientated, not appealing to corporate customers (I’ve not noticed it offering any efficiency savings or benefits over Windows 7 or XP; in speed of operation, simplicity, file size requirements, compatibility or stability). It really only make sense on touchscreens and tablets. But when you also consider that Microsoft’s rivals in the tablet OS space control the market, with devices shipping with sales share at 48.2% (Apple) to 43.4% (Android) in Q1 2013; who is demanding a tablet with Microsoft OS?
The Windows 8.1 update is likely to remove the App Ribbon and bring back the Start Button. Maybe the past is the new future for Win OS? Perhaps one day Windows 9 will bring back the simple, relatively unbloated, functionality of Windows XP?
Filed under: 2011 December | 1 Comment
Tags: Android, Apple, Tablet OS, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows XP
MW4 – Call of Duty Ghosts leaked
News of the new MW4 FPS game, to be called Call of Duty Ghosts, has been leaked today after it was temporarily referenced on a retailer’s website.
More news will follow in May 2013 about the launch later this year.
MW4 – Call of Duty Ghosts
Filed under: 2011 December | Leave a Comment
Silent Routine Ends
Apologies I’ve not posted here in several months.
What have I been up to?
I joined MESH Planning in November 2012. Outside of my busy day job, I’ve also been working on several new strategic planning tools and presentations.
I also run the Twitter feed for Plannersphere (https://twitter.com/plannersphere) and this account now has 1,200 followers and has spawned The Plannersphere Daily News (http://paper.li/Plannersphere).
Life has also been hectic for my family, as my son and daughter (twins) joined new schools last year.
I will be posting a few items over the next couple of weeks to clear some back log items.
Thanks for dropping by.
Kevin Sugrue
Filed under: 2011 December | Leave a Comment
