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15 hours ago
EnlargeA year after its flubbed tablet introduction, Microsoft is back with a new Surface.
The US tech giant, which has invited media to a launch in New York, is seeking to correct missteps from its first try and gain a foothold in the tablet market dominated by Apple’s iPad and others using the Google Android operating system.
Details of the new device were not known, but many analysts expect a more powerful Surface tablet to help Microsoft build momentum in mobile computing.
Microsoft, which is trying to shift its focus to “devices and services” to better compete with Apple and Google, barely made a dent in the sizzling tablet market since introducing the first-generation Surface in October.
The company has not released sales figures, but reported tablet revenues of just $ 853 million in the fiscal year ended in June. Research firm IDC said Microsoft sold 900,000 in the first quarter of the year—a market share of just 1.8 percent—and even fewer in the second quarter. Apple by comparison sold some 34 million iPads in the first half of 2013.
Microsoft was forced to take an embarrassing $ 900 million writedown for “inventory adjustments” due to weak sales of the new tablet, which has a basic version and a more expensive “Pro” model.
Will things be different this time?
Rob Enderle, analyst and consultant with Enderle Group, said he expects the new tablets to be much improved.
“This new release should be massively better than the first one. The trick will be getting folks to look at the product fresh,” he told AFP.
Enderle said the first version “was too heavy, too expensive and had poor battery life,” and the upgraded Surface Pro lacked a key element, the Outlook email program.
Microsoft appears to have fixes these issues and now has a chance to gain some traction with a device that aims to serve as a tablet with some of the functionality of a laptop PC.
“Right now, people don’t want to carry a large tablet and laptop,” said Enderle.
“If you can consolidate into one product, it lightens your load and it’s a lot cheaper.”
Jack Gold, analyst at J. Gold Associates, said the first Surface “was not a complete device” and did not work with many Windows apps.
Gold said Microsoft can succeed with “a reasonably priced and performance-oriented Pro” to appeal to business users, but that the company “has to build momentum before Android makes it mostly irrelevant.”
Others argue that Microsoft’s strategy has become muddled as it tries to gain ground in the “high mobility” computing segment while still serving the hundreds of millions using conventional PCs on the Windows operating system.
Roger Kay at Endpoint Technologies Associates said Microsoft has been struggling to serve these sometimes conflicting goals.
“The ambiguity of Windows 8 is built into its architecture,” Kay said.
“Microsoft has been doing nothing but looking over its shoulder. You need to have your own vision of what people need.”
Kay said Microsoft still has a long road to become a meaningful player in mobile computing.
“High mobility and that form factor are up for grabs between Apple and Google and perhaps Microsoft, but Microsoft will be a distant third,” he added.
Kay said Microsoft’s best chance in the segment was to build momentum with its acquisition of Nokia’s phone business, and extend that into tablets.
Kash Rangan, analyst at Bank of America/Merrill Lynch, said Microsoft is hurt by a “diffused focus” as it tries to reorganize, search for a new chief executive and reboot its mobile strategy with its Nokia acquisition.
“We worry about the tsunami of changes the company is currently undergoing,” Rangan said in a note to clients with a “neutral” investment rating.
“The reorganization, CEO change, acquisition of Nokia, and financial reporting structure change are all occurring simultaneously, and only serve to increase the complexity of the investment story.”
© 2013 AFP
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User comments : 5
Adjust slider to filter visible comments by rank
Display comments: newest first
arq
not rated yet 15 hours ago
Where the hell is the new surface as the headline suggests?
Eikka
5 / 5 (2) 12 hours ago
They should instead leverage the PC heritage and make a pad capable of running and multitasking common PC productivity software instead of limited “cloud” and java applications like Google, or dumbed down apps not much different from a website applet on Apple’s devices. They should try to do what they’re good at and make a flexible platform that doesn’t depend on appstores or repositories or constant fast online access to run.
There’s no reason why you can’t run something akin to a traditional PC desktop on a tablet. A 7″ tablet in your hand is as large as a 20″ monitor on the table, so it’s not a problem of screen real-estate. It’s a matter of re-thinking the mouse as a touch interface to get the required precision, and you can ditch the dumbed down user interfaces.
NikFromNYC
3 / 5 (2) 10 hours ago
Weird rubber keyboards that can’t be used on beds or couches don’t sell? Next stop promised by dozens of articles a year on Phys.org: flexible displays that defeat robust touch screen usability. Not a single Surface have I seen in any coffee shop around the Columbia University area. The heavy battery laden tablet would smash to the floor every time their table is bumped. It’s just bad design in the Age Of Hype. In other news the human brain itself will be surpassed in a decade, by glorified graphing calculators.
Eikka
1 / 5 (1) 6 hours ago
Meanwhile, consumers are more than happy to use Windows XP’s ancient classic interface and don’t mind that it’s bug-ugly, because it’s consistent and it works, and it gives you a paradigm that you can understand instead of everything just happening by “magic”. People need to know at least a bit about what happens under the hood to understand what they’re doing
Steve Jobs once said that he wants computers to be more like home appliances, but the problem with appliances is that people can’t even set the clock on their microwave ovens because the internal workings of the device are abstracted away behind a “magic” and impenetrable user interface that just doesn’t let the user to reach in and change the time because it’s designed to do just one thing
Jonseer
5 / 5 (1) 1 hour ago
Microsoft has never recognized that people expect Microsoft products to be the lowest price of all offerings in the market thanks to the paradigm the PC by Windows PC makers.
Apple has always been more expensive, even if Windows PCs offered far more for far less.
In the tablet market people expect the same.
It doesn’t matter if Microsoft is making them, they expect it to be extremely inexpensive and loaded with all the hardware features you can think of.
Because MS didn’t take the tablet market seriously, it allowed Google to take that tactic and that’s why Google rapidly became #1.
Unfortunately for MS it still is the only tactic it can use.
To have any chance of success Surface has to be sold at cost or below, and MS has to be willing to take huge losses for a couple of years before it sees success.
Anything else and it will fail. MS can’t overcome decades of expectations with 1 marketing campaign.
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15 hours ago
EnlargeA year after its flubbed tablet introduction, Microsoft is back with a new Surface.
The US tech giant, which has invited media to a launch in New York, is seeking to correct missteps from its first try and gain a foothold in the tablet market dominated by Apple’s iPad and others using the Google Android operating system.
Details of the new device were not known, but many analysts expect a more powerful Surface tablet to help Microsoft build momentum in mobile computing.
Microsoft, which is trying to shift its focus to “devices and services” to better compete with Apple and Google, barely made a dent in the sizzling tablet market since introducing the first-generation Surface in October.
The company has not released sales figures, but reported tablet revenues of just $ 853 million in the fiscal year ended in June. Research firm IDC said Microsoft sold 900,000 in the first quarter of the year—a market share of just 1.8 percent—and even fewer in the second quarter. Apple by comparison sold some 34 million iPads in the first half of 2013.
Microsoft was forced to take an embarrassing $ 900 million writedown for “inventory adjustments” due to weak sales of the new tablet, which has a basic version and a more expensive “Pro” model.
Will things be different this time?
Rob Enderle, analyst and consultant with Enderle Group, said he expects the new tablets to be much improved.
“This new release should be massively better than the first one. The trick will be getting folks to look at the product fresh,” he told AFP.
Enderle said the first version “was too heavy, too expensive and had poor battery life,” and the upgraded Surface Pro lacked a key element, the Outlook email program.
Microsoft appears to have fixes these issues and now has a chance to gain some traction with a device that aims to serve as a tablet with some of the functionality of a laptop PC.
“Right now, people don’t want to carry a large tablet and laptop,” said Enderle.
“If you can consolidate into one product, it lightens your load and it’s a lot cheaper.”
Jack Gold, analyst at J. Gold Associates, said the first Surface “was not a complete device” and did not work with many Windows apps.
Gold said Microsoft can succeed with “a reasonably priced and performance-oriented Pro” to appeal to business users, but that the company “has to build momentum before Android makes it mostly irrelevant.”
Others argue that Microsoft’s strategy has become muddled as it tries to gain ground in the “high mobility” computing segment while still serving the hundreds of millions using conventional PCs on the Windows operating system.
Roger Kay at Endpoint Technologies Associates said Microsoft has been struggling to serve these sometimes conflicting goals.
“The ambiguity of Windows 8 is built into its architecture,” Kay said.
“Microsoft has been doing nothing but looking over its shoulder. You need to have your own vision of what people need.”
Kay said Microsoft still has a long road to become a meaningful player in mobile computing.
“High mobility and that form factor are up for grabs between Apple and Google and perhaps Microsoft, but Microsoft will be a distant third,” he added.
Kay said Microsoft’s best chance in the segment was to build momentum with its acquisition of Nokia’s phone business, and extend that into tablets.
Kash Rangan, analyst at Bank of America/Merrill Lynch, said Microsoft is hurt by a “diffused focus” as it tries to reorganize, search for a new chief executive and reboot its mobile strategy with its Nokia acquisition.
“We worry about the tsunami of changes the company is currently undergoing,” Rangan said in a note to clients with a “neutral” investment rating.
“The reorganization, CEO change, acquisition of Nokia, and financial reporting structure change are all occurring simultaneously, and only serve to increase the complexity of the investment story.”
© 2013 AFP
Initial Review of iOS 7
How to wirelessly connect laptop to TV
Sony vs Samsung LED TV
RIP Ray Dolby
Nexus 7 and PDF files
Benefits of learning about networking?
More from Physics Forums – Computing & Technology
Related Stories
Microsoft plans Sept. 23 tablet computer event
Microsoft on Monday sent out invitations to a September 23 event at which it is expected to unveil new Surface tablets to challenge iPads and Android devices dominating the market.
Microsoft cuts price of high end Surface tablets
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Apple fans from Tokyo to New York joined the stampede Friday for the latest iPhones as the US tech giant aimed for wider global appeal in the competitive smartphone market.
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(Phys.org) —HP is taking the leap as the first laptop maker to sell a machine with Leap Motion gesture control technology embedded into the computer. HP announced Thursday that the HP ENVY17 Leap Motion …
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User comments : 5
Adjust slider to filter visible comments by rank
Display comments: newest first
arq
not rated yet 15 hours ago
Where the hell is the new surface as the headline suggests?
Eikka
5 / 5 (2) 12 hours ago
Microsoft should learn that if they try to compete in the market of walled garden software ecosystems with Android and iOS, it’s a losing battle because the users will flock to the platform with most users.
They should instead leverage the PC heritage and make a pad capable of running and multitasking common PC productivity software instead of limited “cloud” and java applications like Google, or dumbed down apps not much different from a website applet on Apple’s devices. They should try to do what they’re good at and make a flexible platform that doesn’t depend on appstores or repositories or constant fast online access to run.
There’s no reason why you can’t run something akin to a traditional PC desktop on a tablet. A 7″ tablet in your hand is as large as a 20″ monitor on the table, so it’s not a problem of screen real-estate. It’s a matter of re-thinking the mouse as a touch interface to get the required precision, and you can ditch the dumbed down user interfaces.
NikFromNYC
3 / 5 (2) 10 hours ago
Weird rubber keyboards that can’t be used on beds or couches don’t sell? Next stop promised by dozens of articles a year on Phys.org: flexible displays that defeat robust touch screen usability. Not a single Surface have I seen in any coffee shop around the Columbia University area. The heavy battery laden tablet would smash to the floor every time their table is bumped. It’s just bad design in the Age Of Hype. In other news the human brain itself will be surpassed in a decade, by glorified graphing calculators.
Eikka
1 / 5 (1) 6 hours ago
Generally speaking, I think tablet and cellphone manufacturers are trying too much to be sci-fi and implement or at least imitate all the dysfunctional crud they saw in movies when they were 13 and though “wow that LCARS stuff is so cool!”.
Meanwhile, consumers are more than happy to use Windows XP’s ancient classic interface and don’t mind that it’s bug-ugly, because it’s consistent and it works, and it gives you a paradigm that you can understand instead of everything just happening by “magic”. People need to know at least a bit about what happens under the hood to understand what they’re doing
Steve Jobs once said that he wants computers to be more like home appliances, but the problem with appliances is that people can’t even set the clock on their microwave ovens because the internal workings of the device are abstracted away behind a “magic” and impenetrable user interface that just doesn’t let the user to reach in and change the time because it’s designed to do just one thing
Jonseer
5 / 5 (1) 1 hour ago
As long as Microsoft tries to sell it at a premium price it will fail.
Microsoft has never recognized that people expect Microsoft products to be the lowest price of all offerings in the market thanks to the paradigm the PC by Windows PC makers.
Apple has always been more expensive, even if Windows PCs offered far more for far less.
In the tablet market people expect the same.
It doesn’t matter if Microsoft is making them, they expect it to be extremely inexpensive and loaded with all the hardware features you can think of.
Because MS didn’t take the tablet market seriously, it allowed Google to take that tactic and that’s why Google rapidly became #1.
Unfortunately for MS it still is the only tactic it can use.
To have any chance of success Surface has to be sold at cost or below, and MS has to be willing to take huge losses for a couple of years before it sees success.
Anything else and it will fail. MS can’t overcome decades of expectations with 1 marketing campaign.
More news stories
Tests: New iPhones less durable than iPhone 5 (Update)
As Apple pitches its newest smartphones, users may find something lacking compared with last year’s model: They could break more easily.
Emotional attachment to robots could affect outcome on battlefield
(Phys.org) —Too busy to vacuum your living room? Let Roomba the robot do it. Don’t want to risk a soldier’s life to disable an explosive? Let a robot do it.
Apple’s Touch ID: Time to come to grips with a touchy subject
Apple’s latest and greatest – the iPhone 5s – met a muted reception last week in San Francisco. Although the device’s admittedly evolutionary-not-revolutionary updates target early adopters and high-end co …
Apple buyers rue high price of new ‘low cost’ iPhone (Update 2)
Apple fans clamouring for the two new iPhones formed a kilometre-long queue in Tokyo Friday, but high prices in Asia and the lack of a new tie-up in the vast China market dampened the global roll out.
HP marks October availability of gesture-control PC (w/ Video)
(Phys.org) —HP is taking the leap as the first laptop maker to sell a machine with Leap Motion gesture control technology embedded into the computer. HP announced Thursday that the HP ENVY17 Leap Motion …
Scientists explain the formation of unusual ring of radiation in space
Since the discovery of the Van Allen radiation belts in 1958, space scientists have believed these belts encircling the Earth consist of two doughnut-shaped rings of highly charged particles—an inner ring …
First evidence that fear memories can be reduced during sleep
A fear memory was reduced in people by exposing them to the memory over and over again while they slept. It’s the first time that emotional memory has been manipulated in humans during sleep, report Northwestern …
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(Phys.org) —Can your microwave oven power other gadgets in your kitchen? That is the question explored in the paper, “Power Harvesting from Microwave Oven Electromagnetic Leakage,” by researchers from …
Carbon cleanup would save millions of lives, study finds
Reducing fossil-fuel emissions to safer levels would save millions of lives annually by the end of the century, a study said on Sunday.
Creating electricity with caged atoms
Clathrates are crystals consisting of tiny cages in which single atoms can be enclosed. These atoms significantly alter the material properties of the crystal. By trapping cerium atoms in a clathrate, scientists …
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