Another day, another Apple Tablet rumor. In the latest piece of gossip pertaining to Apple's as of yet un-announced tablet, Yair Riener of Oppenheimer laid down some interesting, albeit un-sourced, information about Apple's rumored Tablet device.
Another day, another Apple Tablet rumor. In the latest piece of gossip pertaining to Apple’s as of yet un-announced tablet, Yair Riener of Oppenheimer laid down some interesting, albeit un-sourced, information.
Writing to investors Wednesday morning, Reiner writes that Apple is planning to launch the Tablet sometime between March and April, and that the manufacturing process is scheduled to begin shortly. “At this stage,” Reiner stated, “Apple appears to be sizing its supply chain to support production of as many as 1M units per month.”
But to be honest, who cares about production units when we still don’t know much in the way of specs. And to that end, Reiner writes that the Apple Tablet will sport a 10.1 inch LCD multitouch screen, which contradicts earlier reports which had the tablet coming equipped with an OLED screen.
One of the more interesting aspects of Reiner’s report centers on Apple working diligently to attract publishers by making them offers they simply can’t refuse. Remember that the Tablet is being positioned, or so the rumors seem to indicate, as an e-book reader, among other things. That said, if Apple really wants to establish the Tablet as a medium for print media, it’s necessarily has to rely on the content from big publishing houses – who are understandably wary of Apple given how much power they were able to obtain in the music industry.
Nevertheless, Reiner’s note notes that Apple is offering a 30/70 revenue split with publishers, an arrangement which has obviously worked well thus far with the iTunes App Store. In contrast, it’s believed that the split publishers currently have with Amazon for the Kindle is more in the ballpark of 50/50, with a 30/70 split available only if the content is made a Kindle exclusive.
Lastly, Reiner anticiptes that Apple will sell anywhere from 1 to 1.5 million Tablet devices per quarter in 2010. Not too shabby for a product that officially doesn’t even exist yet.
