Samsung has managed to sell 1 million of its Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) Android powered Galaxy Tab tablet PCs in the last 60 days. Next spring, computer manufacturer Acer is going to enter the United States tablet market with not one but two separate tablet PCs running Google’s versatile mobile operating system, a premium 10-inch model and a more portable 7-inch model not dissimilar to Samsung’s Android device. By this measure it seems that Google has stayed largely outside of the tablet PC dialogue, distancing itself from products like the Galaxy Tab saying that the version of Android these tablets run, the Froyo Android 2.2, isn’t optimized for tablet use and therefore not suited for comparison to Apple’s tablet-tweaked iOS 4. Now it looks like Google is ready to take on the iPad, using the same fruitful partnership that propelled the Droid against the iPhone in the smartphone market.
At the D: Dive Into Mobile event, Google Vice President of Engineering Andy Rubin showed off a prototype Android tablet manufactured by Motorola (NYSE: MOT), the maker of the Verizon-backed (NYSE: VZ) Droid phones that helped solidify Android as a major mobile software competitor to both Apple and Research in Motion (NASDAQ: RIMM). Google’s unnamed Motorola Android tablet sports what Rubin called a “dual core 3D processor,” an NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) processor, and video chat capabilities. Beyond those vague specs, Rubin declined to expand on other features that will set the tablet apart. He did tell the crowd, however, that the Motorola Android tablet was running on Honeycomb, the 2.4 version of Android that will be tailor-made for tablet implementation. Rubin described the Honeycomb apps as having more of “desktop” style and said the traditional Android buttons familiar from the Froyo version of the operating system were missing.
It isn’t surprising at all to see Google giving a glimpse of its inevitable tablet offering from Motorola, but it is somewhat shocking to hear that the Android 2.4 Gingerbread will not be optimized for tablet use. Google’s other big reveal at the D: Dive Into Mobile was the Nexus S smartphone from Samsung, the flagship device for the Gingerbread version of Android. New features attendant to the update are a new download manager, a redesigned multi-touch keyboard, Near Field Communication support, and improved interface features like copy and paste functions. There are no dramatic features that indicate Gingerbread will greatly benefit other Samsung products like the Galaxy Tab, indicating that Google may force other competitors in the tablet space to rush new models out by the time its Motorola-made tablet is ready for primetime.
Investors, meanwhile, can take the debut of this prototype as a good sign that the tablet market is heating up, and despite buzz surrounding early contenders like the iPad and Galaxy Tab, there’s still a whole lot of time between now and when real competition comes to the sector.
As of this writing, Anthony Agnello did not own a position in any of the stocks named here.
