CES 2011: The Blackberry Tablet Stands Out

CES 2011 Las Vegas featured one of the coolest exhibits this blogger has ever seen: The World Of Blackberry. Much of the buzz was around Blackberry's new tablet "The Playbook." Now, there were an estimated 75 different tablets at the 2011 Consumer Electronic Show. What makes Blackberry's tablet stand out? Well, money in marketing, retail outlets, and service.



CES 2011 is a show for retail buyers to be convinced to purchase thousands of units of a product for sale at their outlets at a price markup such that they can make money along with the manufacturer. Blackberry has thousands of long-standing relationships with buyers, and wants to gain new ones, so having a big presence at CES 2011 is critical.

The Blackberry Tablet is, frankly, a very sexy device because of its size: that of a giant postcard of 5 by 7, and because of its gaming, multimedia and video conferencing capabilties. I've stated that Apple's iPad would be the preferred device for kids because of its larger size. But Blackberry's aim is the business market, where it already has a significant foothold with its smartphones. From that perspective, it appears to be on to something.

Moreover, the issue of Apple's iPad not using Adobe Flash (because of a war between the companies that has taken on a personal tinge) may, over time, get it into trouble. From a marketing standpoint, products using Android and now Android 3.0 Gingerbread are being marketed as being more "open" than Apple's popular iPad. The Blackberry Tablet's called "flash-loving" by tech publications, a term that should give Apple's Steve Jobs some concern.

I think.

But what we're seeing in 2011 is a flood of tablets on the American market and many from smartphone makers like HTC (to come later in the year), and Samsung (at CES) - that was reflected at CES 2011 Las Vegas. A friend pointed out to me that tablets are already standard to some degree in Asia, so we're just catching up. The Blackberry Playbook is new: the tablet by makers like iQuality out of Asia, and the subject of a video coming later today, are out already and are feature-competitive with Blackberry's new-to-the-market tablet.

But with all that, what Blackberry has, as I've stated, is a heavy retail and service network. If you need your tablet repaired within a reasonable time period and at little cost because of a great warranty program, that's something to consider.