The tablet market is by far the fastest expanding market in the realm of technology. With people seeing the advantages for ultra portable devices, the tablet is taking off faster than most people expected. But one company who knew this would be a major game changer was Apple. With the release of the iPad, Apple has forever changed the computing landscape. But they also created a new market. Up to that point the tablet had been a very niche product. However as soon as Apple decided to put some research and development into how to make the tablet more suitable for main stream usage, people started to notice how fantastic these pieces of technology can be.
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| The Apple iPad |
It was not just consumers who took notice though. Other technology companies started to notice as well. Companies like Samsung, Dell, Motorola and Research in Motion have all released a tablet that they hope will cut into Apple's huge market share and bring some of the very lucrative expanding market into their hands. But the problem for these companies is that Apple has had such a huge head start that it has made competition essentially nonexistent. The fact is that now Apple has become synonymous with the phrase "tablet", and that makes it very hard for other companies to gain any sort of market share. Apple does a very good job of making their products the first thing you think about in mobile computing.
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| Apple Store Location |
From their iPod's to the iPhone and now the iPad, Apple has been able to keep their products in the forefront of each market, and they do so early on in the life cycle of innovation. It started with the iPod. Before people even knew they wanted to have their entire music collection in their pocket, Apple had created the iPod. And now with the iPad, they have done the same thing, making it very hard for competitors to break into the market. Being the first to market is everything, and Apple has capitalized on that competitive advantage over and over again and it looks like they will continue to do so for a long time.
