Research in Motion (RIM) announced this week that its updated 7-inch PlayBook will go on sale in Canada starting August 9, 2012. The PlayBook OS 2.0 will include 32 GB of storage and 4G connectivity capabilities. While the company has not mentioned the cost, Telus, one of Canada’s largest carriers, has priced the tablet at $549.99. The company has not released a launch date in the United States and other countries.
RIM
made
upgrades to its PlayBook in February 2012 to address concerns. Its new
tablet will included integrated features like email, however, the update and
the latest release should do little to help the company’s image.
Concluding Thoughts
The
company’s decision to launch the tablet on its home turf in Canada seems
logical as the tablet should not gain much attention in the United States. The
tablet could also gain ground in India, a growing market for RIM, but the
company attracted negative attention in that country this week. India claimed
RIM provided encryption keys to secure corporate email and messaging services.
RIM denied this, said the company does not possess those keys and that the keys
are left in the hands of its corporate users.
Ultimately,
RIM still comes across as running on borrowed time. The latest release should not deflect criticism related to the delay of chipsets needed for its BlackBerry 10 phones. Consumers would rather have that needed release, rather than a tablet that does not seem competitive in
today’s market. Given the choices of Android tablets available on the market,
including the Kindle Fire and Google Nexus 7, consumers will receive better
deals elsewhere.
No comments:
Post a Comment