The key question that seems to be cropping up amongst those of us who pontificate about mobile devices is how much market share RIM’s PlayBook is likely to steal from Apple’s iPad. So I’ll answer that question right up front — not much.
But that doesn’t mean the PlayBook won’t sell well, because I think it will. It just means that the PlayBook and the iPad aren’t really competing in the same game.
And, of course, this is why the PlayBook has a very good chance at succeeding in its intended market, regardless of what happens to the iPad. The PlayBook, quite frankly, isn’t an iPad wanna-be; it’s a business tablet that will support some consumer functions, which is exactly the opposite of what the iPad is designed to be.
When you look at RIM’s presentation on the PlayBook, you’ll notice that it is filled with business-related cues, ranging from the front page of The Wall Street Journal and a PowerPoint presentation, to the United Airlines flight-confirmation page. There are no games and no music chat, for instance. In addition, while the PlayBook does support the ability to play music, and while it does support two cameras, one on the front and one on the rear, they’re presented as solutions to video conferencing or imaging.
Clearly, while RIM wants you to see exactly how cool its tablet is, they don’t want you to think of it as frivolous. The PlayBook — despite the name — isn’t designed for play at all. In fact, I would suggest that the name refers to the complex play books that National Football League teams use to prepare their game plans, rather than to some kind of appliance for playing video games.
While there are a lot of things that the PlayBook doesn’t do, there are also some things that only the PlayBook — out of all the tablets being launched right now — can do. Most notably it includes support for Blackberry Enterprise Server. No other tablet offers that. The device also supports the full gamut of 802.11 flavors, so it should work in most offices just fine.
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The PlayBook looks like it could be the ideal companion tablet for the millions of corporate Blackberry users tired of iPad envy. With built-in tethering and BES (Blackberry Enterprise Server) compatibility, IT won't have the same reservations they have about the iPad (even though there are secure iPad deployment options), plus RIM is probably already on the company approved vendor list.
No doubt the PlayBook will do a good job with email and the browser will work well for browsing, but with the 7" HD display, business users will also want access to all their business apps or even their full Windows 7 work environment. One way to enable that will be the Citrix Receiver for PlayBook, just as 100 million users use Citrix everyday to get virtual apps and desktops delivered to their PC, Mac, thin client or smartphone. The highly regarded Receiver for iPad for example is now one of the top app store business downloads and is used by professionals everywhere to be more productive without the chore of lugging a laptop.
Many reviewers point to the hundreds of thousands of apps available for iOS compared to the few for Playbook's QNX, however when it comes to business apps the difference is not huge especially given that Receiver makes thousands of windows & web business apps available for both platforms. However the PlayBook will need to compete on the merits of usability, speed, battery life and other areas where the iPad excels.
The planned Citrix Receiver for PlayBook will provide a great user experience while making all the company virtual apps and desktops available on-demand anywhere. Windows apps and desktops can run securely on company servers (or the cloud) and the User Interface is delivered to the remote tablet display using the optimised HDX protocol. Gestures and keystrokes are sent securely to the servers and the user gets an experience as if the Windows desktop is running locally on the tablet. PlayBook users will get the freedom to get work done from anywhere with access to any business app they need.
Chris Fleck, vice president of Community and Solutions Development at Citrix