14 DAY TRIAL // A Microsoft-branded Windows 8 tablet is reportedly in the company’s plans for 2012. To this I say, about time! The Redmond company has yet to confirm the information from DigiTimes, and will most certainly remain mute when asked to comment on speculation. Still, if there’s any truth to the report, the software giant could have an important weapon against Apple and Google.
In mid-May 2011 I wrote an article exploring the possibility of Windows 8 form factors coming from directly Microsoft on top of those from its OEM partners.
It should be clear even to Microsoft by this point in time that original equipment manufacturers cannot deal with Apple by themselves. The Coupertino-based company’s immense success with devices such as iPhone and iPad should be all the proof that anybody would require.
And, if I’m not mistaken, OEMs had a shot at the tablets market years ago, when Microsoft released Windows XP Tablet PC edition the past decade. What happened? Well, nothing.
Just for the sake of the argument, let’s consider that Windows XP Tablet PC Edition as well as the Tablet PCs it shipped on were in the wrong place at the wrong time, or too ahead of their time to be successful, whichever you prefer.
There have been slates with Windows 7 available for quite some time now, and some really good machines, matching fully fledged computers power-wise. Some of them are even more reasonably priced than the iPad. And yet, still nothing.
In all fairness, Windows 7 is not a Tablet PC operating system, so I see the platform as the main handicap of OEM slates currently available.
But this could all change with a Microsoft branded Windows 8 tablet. A product marketed specifically to the target audiences of Google and Apple, made for the elite, and not for the most common denominator.
Bill Gates should sign each Microsoft Windows 8 tablet and Steve Ballmer could personally box each device.
It can certainly work, as long as the software giant doesn’t refuse to provide itself with an edge.
The way I see it, the Redmond company is limiting itself. Sure, there’s no denying that the Microsoft OEM partnership is an extraordinary example of business success.
There’s also the matter of the Windows Division’s revenue, which comes largely from sales of Windows licenses pre-installed on new OEM PCs.
Some might argue that Microsoft producing its own some form factors featuring Windows 8 will alienate OEMs. I see absolutely no possibility of this.
And there are a few precedents, devices such as Zune and Xbox, but also Microsoft Stores. Did you see any retailers swearing off Microsoft after the company started opening its own outlets? Neither have I.
There’s simply too intimate of a symbiosis between OEMs and Microsoft for them to divorce the software giant. They need Windows.
And a Windows 8 tablet directly from the software giant, or a few Windows 8 Microsoft branded form factors will only represent the exception, and not the rule. Such products would be designed specifically to tackle Apple and Google. OEMs can still fight it off for the rest of the consumers.
What your take on a Microsoft-branded Windows 8 tablet? In fact, what’s your take on a variety of Microsoft-branded Windows 8 form factors?