Today BlackBerry launched its second flagship smartphone, the keyboard-equipped Q10 smartphone,CEO Thorsten Heins is once again understating the importance of tablets in the mobile market. “In five years I don’t think there will be a reason to have a tablet anymore,” Heins told Bloomberg in an interview.”Maybe a big screen in your workspace, but not a tablet as such.Tablets themselves are not a good business model.” He based this assessment on their failed success of BlackBerry’s PlayBook tablet , which quickly dropped in price after unsold inventory caused it to take a $485 million loss in late 2011.
Ever since he became CEO, Heins has slowly backed away from tablets: the company remained “committed” to them in mid-2012, but by early 2013, Heins indicated that their future depended on how well BlackBerry did with its new platform on phones. For BlackBerry, which is struggling to carve out a niche with the new Z10 and now Q10, this makes perfect sense. But now, he’s suggesting that not only is BlackBerry likely staying out, the market itself is dying.
The fairly confident CEO has also said that he’s interested in replacing tablets or laptops with phone-powered devices, a futuristic idea that hasn’t worked out very well for others who have tried it. Do u think the Blackberry CEO has a point that tablets will be obsolete in the coming 5 years? Feel free to leave a comment below.
