STRATEGY: Mountain View Firm, Google Leaves the Tablet Market to Focus on Laptops
Google and tablets, it’s almost over. The company of Mountain View cut short the rumours by indicating, this Thursday, June 20, its intention to interrupt the work of development of its new tablets. The firm confirmed this information from the Computerworld site by the voice of Rick Osterloh, Google’s hardware manager.
Hey, it’s true…Google’s HARDWARE team will be solely focused on building laptops moving forward, but make no mistake, Android & Chrome OS teams are 100% committed for the long-run on working with our partners on tablets for all segments of the market (consumer, enterprise, edu)
— Rick Osterloh (@rosterloh) 20 June 2019
User support maintained until 2024
This decision comes as Google originally planned to release two new versions of its latest Pixel Slate tablet, unveiled last October. The firm has finally changed its mind and stops all work related to these products to focus on the notebook PC market. The Pixel Slate will have no successor. However, the firm wants to reassure its users: they will continue to receive support until 2024.
Google was struggling to find a place in the hardware market, some of its products not meeting the expected success. According to Presse-Citron , the firm does not interrupt the development of smartphones in the Pixel range, nor that of its connected speakers.
Google could launch a brand new laptop under Chrome OS by the end of 2019.
