A Smaller iPad?

The blogosphere is abuzz with rumors that Apple will release a smaller version of the iPad to compete more directly with Amazon's Kindle Fire and the soon-to-be-released Google Nexus 7. The key questions are:

1. Will Apple release such a tablet?
2. If so, when?
3. ...And for how much?

It seems to me that a lot of the speculation so far has failed to consider other expected changes in Apple's product lineup in the coming year that would have a significant impact on the roll-out of any new tablet. With that in mind, here's my take, in reverse order.



3. Each year in each iDevice family, Apple rolls out a new family member at the old price point and drops the old model down by $100. Witness the $200 iPhone 4S, the $100 iPhone 4, and the $0 iPhone 3GS; witness the $500 The New iPad and the $400 iPad 2. If the pattern continues, we can expect them to deliver a new (10-inch) The New iPad next spring and to drop the price of the iPad 2 to $300. Now, Apple's only significant competition in the tablet space (the Fire) sells for $200, and the Nexus 7 will as well. And the relatively small non-Retina display on a hypothetical smaller iPad would likely necessitate its being sold more cheaply than the iPad 2. Therefore, my guess is that Apple will hold to its pattern of $100 price increments in order to meet its competition head-on. If a smaller iPad is released, Apple will sell it for $200. The only other options would seem to be $250, which would play into the popular-but-largely-untrue "Apple is expensive" meme.  Apple's Tim Cook in 2009: "One thing we'll make sure is that we don't leave a price umbrella for people".

2. The consensus seems to be that a new smaller iPad would use the same display as the iPhone 3GS. Marco Arment notes that if Apple is on the verge of a huge holiday roll-out, they must be ramping up manufacturing -- so where are the leaks? Perhaps there will be no fall release after all. Here's the thing: at least for the screen, manufacturing is already ramped up. We can expect Apple to release a The New iPhone this fall; at that time, the 4 and 4S will each drop in price, and Apple will stop offering the 3GS. Apple can flip its existing 3GS processes into iPad mode; the 3GS won't need them anymore. And as John Gruber notes, we also have a possible leak of the case. My prediction: Any new smaller iPad will be released this fall to coincide with the availability of the necessary screen technology.

1. So, will they pull the trigger? Yes. Remember the iPod Mini? Apple released the original hard-drive-based iPod to great fanfare, but it was big and heavy and expensive. Competitors found refuge in low-end flash-memory-based devices. Apple's dominance of portable music players truly began when they entered this lower-end market. With their skill in design, they could release more appealing products than their competitors; with their scale of manufacturing and distribution, they could get those products into customers' hands in more places for less money. We will see the same pattern repeated with tablets.