At the beginning of the year, Microsoft launched their new lineup of laptop computers called the Surface . What special about the Surface was that it can also be a tablet when detached from the keyboard. It may sound like a wonderful idea. A laptop that can be broken into a tablet and the keyboard. The problem with the Microsoft Surface was that the Apple iPad has the same feature and iPad was introduced years ago. With additional purchase of a keyboard, not only is the iPad thinner and lighter, it can also be cheaper depending on the configuration.
Why would anyone want the Microsoft Surface then?
In fact, no one did. Microsoft had to slash the price of the tablet in order to get rid of the inventory. At the end, Microsoft wrote off about $900 million on the Surface RT, the more affordable model, alone. What Microsoft failed to do was to identify its strong competitor, the iPad. The Apple tablet is more developed and well established, there was no way that the Surface is able to take a bite of Apple iPad’s market share.
“Microsoft: That $900m Surface write-down is smarting • The Register.” Microsoft: That $900m Surface write-down is smarting • The Register. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2013. <http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/15/microsoft_surface_channel/>.
“The Wall Street Journal.” Digits RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2013. <http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2013/07/18/microsoft-takes-900-million-writeoff-on-struggling-surface-tablet/>.