iPad 2 Extends Apple's Lead: Apple Will Dominate The Tablet Market For Years
Apple's iPad 2 isn't a massive advance over the first iPad, but with hardware, software, apps, distribution, and pricing combined, it is still by far the best tablet on the market.
Context & Ripple Effects
Steve Jobs introduced the iPad 2 on stage, and Silicon Alley Insider's read is that the incremental upgrade doesn't matter much on spec sheets: Apple wins because no rival matches the combined package of hardware, software, apps, distribution, and pricing. The structural backdrop is a year old — back in April 2010, paidContent made the contrarian case that the iPad would actually strengthen Amazon's position, since every iPad sold feeds a content-hungry device that distributors like Amazon supply.
Demand-side signals already confirm the upgrade cycle is live: used iPads are selling quickly online as owners trade up to the second model. Notably, no syndicated pickups of this piece appear on or about March 7, 2011, so the 'dominant for years' call rests entirely on SAI's own framing rather than a broad press consensus.
First-order effects
- Tablet makers shipping competing slates in 2011 — Samsung, Motorola, HP among those chasing the category — now face a refreshed benchmark whose advantage is the integrated stack rather than any single component, making spec-by-spec comparisons lose force.
- Existing iPad owners upgrading push a wave of used devices into the resale market, extending Apple's install base to price-sensitive second-hand buyers at effectively zero incremental marketing cost.
Second-order effects
- Rivals are forced to answer Apple's ecosystem with ecosystems of their own — app catalogs, media storefronts, retail presence — rather than hardware alone; the 2010 paidContent argument implies Amazon is positioned as a beneficiary of that content demand regardless of which slate wins.
- Apple's own retail channel tightens around the launch: unconfirmed reports say it is cutting 32 games and some third-party peripherals from stores to make room, a signal that shelf space inside Apple retail goes to what serves the flagship franchise.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, the tablet market structurally mirrors what analysts feared about early smartphones: one vertically integrated vendor sets the annual cadence and price floor while licensees compete on fragments, concentrating bargaining power over carriers, component suppliers, and content partners around Apple.
- A durable Apple lead pushes the competitive center of gravity toward distribution and services — the layer where Amazon, per the earlier analysis, is strongest — meaning the real contest may be fought between ecosystems rather than between devices.
The trend: Post-PC computing is consolidating around vertically integrated hardware-software-distribution stacks, with Apple's yearly iPad cadence establishing the benchmark every licensee must clear.