Is Google’s tablet strategy clear enough?

1st September, 2010 by adina
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Debating the importance of the tablet space is probably not necessary nowadays. Arguments that can be brought in its favor would be as notorious as is Apple itself. But it is important to know that it is not enough at all to only have a new device and simply throwing it on the market. And more, being successful in one market does not mean for a company enjoying the same success on no matter what other market. So is the case of Google.

The search giant started to prospect the tablet market by means of its Android mobile operating system. Available to both smartphone and tablet makers, the OS has very recently launched on the Streak of Dell and is also expected to power the Galaxy Tab of Samsung. But recent rumors say that HTC, an important partner of Google in the smartphone market, is going to develop a tablet equipped with the Chrome operating system, in order to compete with the iPad. If rumors prove to be true, then the new device would equally compete with every tablet on the market relying on Android OS.

Then, Google’s decision to offer both operating systems in the same tablet space seems at least suspect. It is obvious that Google wants to take market share away from Apple to bolster the revenue it gets in the market, but it is unclear why it would compete against itself by letting two operating systems to coexist.

This contradicts one of the strongest rules of any organization that claims to be well-run, i.e. never compete against another product or division of the same firm. Google is just doing that by giving vendors the chance to choose the software they want. On the other hand, Apple demonstrates the contrary by showing that a well-designed operating system is capable of doing a great job every time.

It is not necessary that Google acts the same way, as it could argue that Android and Chrome are distinct operating systems in the markets they are meant to and offering a choice of software packages really does make sense. Maybe Google will make this demonstration, but things seem to be different now.

Google has been very successful with every product it offered by now. Unfortunately past success does not necessarily mean a guarantee for the future and things could not be so predictable on the tablet market. Splitting its market is for Google similar to assuming a great risk. The success of the iPad relies mainly on delivering an experience that every consumer knows and loves. On the contrary, when consumers look at Google’s offer, they have to decide whether they choose Chrome or Android. This is exactly the weak point because confusion may appear related to aspects of both platforms. The simple fact of talking about applications or the web leads to the conclusion that consumers may not have both in this world of Google.

Having two operating systems in this market of tablet devices may prove to be a good idea, but may also create confusion and some market-share problems which finally may prove that acting like this was a mistake. While Apple has demonstrated that a single operating system in the tablet market can work perfectly, the multi-OS strategy adopted by Google creates some confusion for the moment but only the future will decide whether it was a brilliant or a suicidal idea.


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