I feel that a lot of the shortcomings of the iPad as a platform are really a consequence of the chicken or egg problem. For the platform to be viable, you need a lot of good apps, and to make good apps a possibility, the platform needs to be monetizable. Currently, the iPad lacks on all 2 fronts.
Apple isn't leading either on the software front. All the stock apps are just resized apps of their iOS counterparts with nothing extraordinary about them. Most happy users are just using a bigger web-browser, or a bigger drawing app (with the same functionality as on smaller screens), or custom apps that are uploaded on an educational/enterprise portal and are a job requirement. A lot of families use it as an entertainment/learning device for their children where its processing power is underused.
There is almost no money to be made as a developer if you spend all that effort supporting multitasking or adding nice iPadOS-only features. Customers won't pay and Apple only makes your life harder with every OS release.
Apple isn't leading either on the software front. All the stock apps are just resized apps of their iOS counterparts with nothing extraordinary about them. Most happy users are just using a bigger web-browser, or a bigger drawing app (with the same functionality as on smaller screens), or custom apps that are uploaded on an educational/enterprise portal and are a job requirement. A lot of families use it as an entertainment/learning device for their children where its processing power is underused.
There is almost no money to be made as a developer if you spend all that effort supporting multitasking or adding nice iPadOS-only features. Customers won't pay and Apple only makes your life harder with every OS release.