[Galaxy Note 10.1 General] BarryH_GEG:
There is no battle. Google could care less whether people buy a Note, TF700, or N10. All they care about is their mobile market share and that's so they can earn revenue through mobile advertising and content sales through Play. The reason for the N4/N7/N10 and their $349/$199/$399 price points is to offer cheap high-featured entries in to the Android world for mainstream consumers to attract them to Android. And Google's subsidizing those prices to make the devices more attractive. They aren't making any money on the N4/N7/N10. Nexus isn't a developer platform anymore. It's a brand. And that brand stands for value. The N4 and N7 will be successful based purely on price.

People looking at $399+ tablets have historically bought iPads. It remains to be seen how successful the N10 will be beyond XDA at $399. A lot of XDA'rs can't stand overlays but consumers like them because they add features and make the device easier to use. If you think about it, iOS

is

an overlay. "Pure Google" out of the box is a pretty barren experience compared to TW, iOS, and the like. Even at $199 the KF is still outselling the N7 which tells you something about what consumers are attracted to. Samsung forking their tablet line in to "value" with the Tab2 at $349 and the Note series with a serious competitive differentiating feature (inking) at $449 was quite smart on their part. I predict the N10 will only be marginally successful because there's not enough about it that's unique to sway people paying $399+ from the iPad (or iPad Mini). We're big advocates of Android. The general consumer doesn't care what OS their tablet's running. All they want is something that works well, gives them lots of content choices, and is easy to use. At $399 the N10's a tough sell in those last two categories. Using my non-technical friends buying tablets as a barometer the only tablet news they've heard is what a great device the new iPad Mini is. If I ask those shopping for big tablets if they've heard about the N10 they say that they've never heard of it or "oh yeah, I remember reading something about it." They have no interest in it.

What geeks are attracted to has nothing to do with a product's overall success. Samsung sold only 750K Galaxy Nexus' which is an embarrassing low number considering it was offered via the carriers at a subsidized price. And to people not looking for a cheap device to use on a prepaid MVNO, the N4 is $150 more than a subsidized Galaxy SIII, One X+, or Droid DNA on a major carrier. And the prepaid market is 15% of overall wireless subscribers. The KF with an Amazon Prime account offers 10X the content and value offered by the N7 and comes with a years worth of free 2-day shipping which is why it's selling so well. So just because Google's pushing cheap subsidized Nexi doesn't guarantee their long-term success. Tons of tablets are going to be sold over the holidays. The only number that matters is what percentage of the total were Nexi. Selling two millions N10's compared to Apple selling 20MM iPads and Mini's is a fail. Samsung sold 2MM Note 10.1's in August and September. Same thing for selling three million N7's against 10MM KF's. And if Google doesn't make a dent in market share over the holidays it's only going to get worse when advertising stops and sales drop off in Q1.

If Google ends up offering an entire range of Android products that they subsidize the price of it'll just push their manufacturing partners out of the Android space. Why do you think MS priced the Surface as high as they did? If that happens Google will sell fewer devices not more. It would take them years and cost billions of dollars to replicate Samsung distribution, marketing, and support network. So what happens after the N4/N7/N10 is really a game of chess. Google would be insane to compete with their partners and the partners aren't going to support the Android eco-system if they can't make money on it. What's next for the Nexus line remains to be seen.