Steve Jobs: 7-inch tablets are ‘dead on arrival’

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In Apple’s earnings call Monday, CEO Steve Jobs derided some upcoming tablets for their lack of size. Presumably referring to Samsung’s Android-powered Galaxy Tab and Research In Motion’s PlayBook -- two 7-inch tablets hitting stores soon -- Jobs said these devices were too small for a pleasant touchscreen experience. “7-inch tablets are tweeners: too big to compete with a smartphone and too small to compete with the iPad,” said Jobs, adding that competing manufacturers were struggling to meet the price point of the iPad, which starts at £429. Both Samsung and RIM have not announced pricing on their tablets. “These are among the reasons that the current crop of 7-inch tablets are going to be DOA -- dead on arrival,” Jobs said during the earnings call. With his aggressive statements, Jobs is clearly attempting to mark the tablet space as Apple’s territory. For several years, scores of tablet PCs have come and gone after failing to fulfill more than a niche. Though the iPad is not the first tablet to hit the market, it’s the first slate-based computer to succeed as a mainstream, general-purpose device. The iPad has its numbers to back it: During its earnings call, Apple said it shipped 4.2 million iPads during the fourth fiscal quarter. At this selling rate, Bernstein Research noted that iPad adoption rates are the fastest in electronics product history. Jobs’ comments on 7-inch tablets pour cold water on rumors claiming that Apple was preparing to release a 7-inch iPad to compete with rivals. In response to the rumor, Apple watcher Jim Dalrymple explained that Apple had already made a 7-inch iPad at the same time as its available 9.7-inch model, and opted for the latter. “Why did Apple choose to go with the larger model instead?” Dalrymple wrote. “Only Steve Jobs knows that for sure.” Jobs appears to have answered that question during Monday’s earnings call. But take his word with a grain of salt -- Jobs has been known to denigrate a product category, only to unveil a similar product later.