HP Touchpad – what can the industry learn?

Unless you have no interest in technology (then why are you reading this?), you will have seen that HP have given up on the Touchpad and WebOS already. I think it was something like 49 days it lasted, one more than the Microsoft Kin. FHKVPNJZ8Q2H

This has prompted them to instigate a kind of Fire Sale of all Touchpads. In the US they went down to $99, selling out in hours. In the UK, amazingly, several retailers have followed suit, dropping the price to just £89 for the 16GB version and £115 for the 32GB version. This represents a drop of hundreds of pounds (£64 for the 32GB). Again, within hours they had all sold out. The websites of some of these retailers went down almost the minute they announced the price drop (dabs.co.uk for instance).

Now, outside of my indignation at that fact that HP have essentially conned loyal buyers into buying the Touchpad at full price a few weeks ago – knowing that they would be killing it off so soon, this is a stunning development. Not the situation itself, more what it tells us.

People want tablets. Many more people than I would have first expected. However, they don’t want to spend more than they would on a laptop or buy a cheap horrible Android tablet (like Elonex’s 7 inch travesty).

The moment a tablet with a good OS (and WebOS could have been one of the best), with good build quality and a decent screen comes out at a price people can actually think about spending – they go nuts to buy it. I include myself in this I might add. I tried desperately to get the 16GB version!

HP will be losing money hand over fist here. However, I think that serves them right for not having the guts to stick it out in the tablet market or the gumption to back WebOS they way they had said they were going to.

It does show that there is a gap in the market. If one of the bigger names (Samsung maybe) can get a Tablet out that has similar specs for say, £150, they would be able to sell every unit they have in days.

Only then will we have a fight for the Apple iPad crown!

Oh look, a pig flying overhead next to a pot of elbow grease.

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