I found this story over at Reuters about the company ISuppli that has looked into the tablet market, and has decided (somehow) that no matter what happens, Apple will continue to dominate the tablet marketplace. The most telling quote from the story is that they firm doubts that anyone will match the “overall performance experience” of the IPad, which would include it’s performance as well as the many apps and such available for it.

However, I have to say that this seems to fly in the face of the growing number of tablet style devices in the pipeline. In the mainland Chinese market, many companies have already developed knockoffs of the ipad running all sorts of different operating systems, and as the production of these devices ramps up, the costs of the components continues to drop.

Major players such as Microsoft and Google are both on track to have various companies using their operatings systems on tablet devices, especially as 2011 rolls around. Micorsoft may be a very strong competitor in the business marketplace, and Google’s ever expanding Android operating system continues to see huge improvements in it’s app offerings. It is very likely that within a couple of years, there will be little difference in Apps between Apple and other companies.

While Apple may enjoy the first mover position, they are very likely to be facing stuff competition. The real question is the actual size of the tablet marketplace, which may be in it’s infancy, similar to what happened when the original Palm Pilot style devices came out. Almost all of the players from that initial market have fallen to the wayside, and the devices have morphed into the smart phones we know today. Perhaps today’s tablets are nothing more than a step towards something much more useful and robust.

Originally Syndicated via RSS from Broadband Wireless Access