Phone
The most famous entrant in the category is Apple Inc.s iPad, which comes out next month. But many other manufacturers are crowding into the niche, and were planning to do so even before Apples announcement in January.
Some of them are making keyboard-less “tablet” computers in the vein of the iPad. Others are making small laptop-like things known as “smartbooks” that will sell for a few hundred dollars.
Hewlett-Packard Co. showed its first smartbook this week in Barcelona at Mobile World Congress, the worlds largest cell phone trade show. At first glance, HPs Compaq AirLife 100 looks just like a netbook – a small laptop – but the inner workings are quite different.
Rather than using Microsoft Corp.s Windows software, the smartbook runs Android, which Google Inc. created for mobile devices and gives away for free. Rather than using a computer processor from Intel Corp. or Advanced Micro Devices Inc., the AirLife uses a chip from Qualcomm Inc. that has cell phone heritage.
The AirLife works somewhat like a cell phone as well: Its ready to use as soon as you flip the lid open. Like a phone, it receives your e-mail even when its in standby mode with the lid closed. Because the Qualcomm chip uses a lot less power than a PC chip, HP says the AirLife can be used for 12 hours between charging.
Smartbooks are like cell phones in another way: Wireless carriers will sell them. Spains Telefonica will sell the AirLife in Europe and Latin America sometime this spring. There are no plans for a U.S. launch, but HP competitor Lenovo Group has revealed a very similar device, the Skylight, which AT&T Inc. will carry in the U.S. (AT&T will also provide wireless broadband service for the iPad.)
The carriers will sell smartbooks because the devices have built-in modems for Internet access on cellular networks. That means theyll usually come with a monthly service fee, in exchange for which carriers will subsidize the purchase prices, perhaps in the $200 to $400 range. (AT&T and Telefonica have not announced their prices yet.)
Dell Inc. is using the same technology – Android software running on a Qualcomm chip – for a tablet computer with a touch screen that is 5 inches on the diagonal. An iPhone screen is 3.5 inches, so the Mini 5 is reminiscent of a big iPhone. Its set to be released in the U.S. later this year.
Freescale Semiconductor Inc. was at the show to demonstrate the types of “in-between” devices that can be made using its chips, including a prototype tablet that slides into a docking station with a keyboard. It also showed the “Qooq,” a French tablet designed to show recipes in the kitchen, for things like “les cupcakes.”
“Theres definitely a space between handsets and laptops, and I think its great for us that Apple has validated that space, as well as HP,” said Freescale spokesman Steve Sperle.
Chip maker Nvidia Corp. brought six tablets and two smartbooks running its chips. Theyre made by Asian manufacturers that are largely unknown to the public, and the idea is that theyll be sold by wireless carriers, said spokesman Shawn Adamek.
The worlds largest maker of PC processors, Intel Corp., doesnt want to be left out of the new market either. It has talked for a few years about getting its chips into “mobile Internet devices,” and that ambition seems to be coming to fruition at last. However, cell phone-style chips such as ones made by Nvidia, Freescale and Qualcomm still have the advantage of using less power, yielding longer battery lives.
While there will be a lot of hardware to choose from, the software for smartbooks and tablets needs work. The PC version of Windows doesnt work on cell phone-style chips, and in any case, isnt designed for small screens. So manufacturers are mostly turning to Android. But Google didnt intend Android to run on screens that are bigger than cell phones. Google doesnt allow Androids online library of applications, the equivalent of the iPhones App Store, to be accessed from smartbooks because it fears the applications wont work well on large screens.
NPD analyst Ross Rubin noted that smartbooks could struggle because its not clear that consumers will take to devices that look like laptops but dont run Windows. The first generation of netbooks ran the Linux operating system, and the category didnt really take off until they started running Windows. And while smartbooks will be cheap because theyll be subsidized by wireless carriers, the carriers will be selling Windows-based netbooks as well, Rubin said.
When it comes to tablets like Dells Mini 5, people will have to be enticed to carry a gadget in addition to their cell phone. The concept is reminiscent of the “personal digital assistants” of the 90s and early 2000s. They never became mainstream – until their functions were combined with the phone to create the “smart” phone.
Much likely rides on Apple here. If the iPad is a success, that will probably set the mold for other “motorcycle” devices, much like the iPhone has defined the smart phone.