I don't own any apple products, nor am I aboard the Apple bandwagon per se, but I honestly don't think this claim is presumptuous at all. Apple currently IS the tablet market and its competitors are barely competing at all.
Motorola's Xoom has been the only real adversary that I've heard of lately (I do not profess to be an expert). The Xoom was superior in terms of all hardware, but it failed to make a dent against Apple simply because Apple executes the tablet exquisitely. Their attention to design is immaculate and in a market like the tablet market--where the entire platform is dependent on design and user interaction--that attention has set them waaaaay ahead of the pack.
Keeping in mind that the Smart cover is probably the most innovative difference between generations 1 and 2 and that Apple are marketing gods, making every buyer want one, I think a billion dollar valuation is easily attainable.
Obviously these aren't official company reports.
If you'd really like i can drag exact figures out of my university's databases but I'd rather not take the time since this is all pretty evident with a little research.
I googled it before I commented, thank you. Note that I asked if you had any numbers. In each of your sales comparisons links, they point to the very same short quote from an analyst. Not the most compelling data, wouldn't you agree?
They cite Misek, Chowdhry and Sterling--only 2 are redundant though they use the quotation in different contexts--but i see what youre getting at.
Thats fair.
Sales of the iPad 2 havent been released officially yet to my knowledge but sales in the first 3 days are thought to be around 600000--more than the original iPad made in its first week and look how well it did in the long run--and to sell around 5.5 million units in its first quarter.
however, actual sales for the Xoom have been so terrible that they're not even releasing them and theyre planning to cut back production for future quarters.
I cant provide any more information than that right now because it literally isnt available to the public as far as I know; however, we can induce from whats above that Apple really isn't feeling the effects predicted by Xoom analysts, if they are feeling effects at all. And this is despite the superior hardware listed in my previous post.
Sure, Motorola dominated at CNET this year, but so did Palm when it announced the Pre and we've seen how that worked out. Like I said earlier, I have no allegiances to Apple but I think its rather difficult to deny that theyre dominating the tablet platform. You seem hypercritical of my evidence which is fine but I have yet to see any to the contrary. If its out there I'm happy to be enlightened.
Motorola's Xoom has been the only real adversary that I've heard of lately (I do not profess to be an expert). The Xoom was superior in terms of all hardware, but it failed to make a dent against Apple simply because Apple executes the tablet exquisitely. Their attention to design is immaculate and in a market like the tablet market--where the entire platform is dependent on design and user interaction--that attention has set them waaaaay ahead of the pack.
Keeping in mind that the Smart cover is probably the most innovative difference between generations 1 and 2 and that Apple are marketing gods, making every buyer want one, I think a billion dollar valuation is easily attainable.