Affordable Tablets: Do We Need More?

Akash Ubislate Tablet

Surfing the net today, one news item attracted my immediate attention – the launch of yet another tablet in the “affordable” category. For me, the launch was not notable because of a new revolutionary products or great features – but simply because it was a launch by Datawind – the same company is involved in the making and marketing of Aakash, the Government backed cheap tablet that has turned out to be a failure till now. How many new tablets the company will sell on the strength of its rather bad reputation is anyone’s guess.

In an earlier article, I had noted that affordable tablets have a special role in the Indian context. This is for two reasons, primarily. First, the increasing trend in India towards accessing internet on mobile devices – a recent study reveals that more Indian users access the web on mobile devices when compared to desktops. Second, the price sensitivity of Indian customers is also a factor, not to mention the extremely limited buying power of most of the population.

HCL MyEdu Tablet

In this light, tablets acquire a special role in ensuring easy and cheap access to internet on cheap devices. Also, the availability of cheap tablets means an immediate expansion in the target market – for example, school students. Indeed, some of the tablets are squarely targeted for young students – and with names such as EduTab – the stress is on the utility for students. Even the cheapest desktops are still expensive for most of the Indian buyers, and a cheap tablet provides an entry point to experience internet connectivity, even if the other features are very limited in scope.

Even a cursory analysis of the Indian market reveals a clear preference for affordable or cheap tablets. There must be almost dozens of models spread over a number of brands – almost every major player in electronics segment has a tablet model in the market. Apparently, they assume that the market is potentially lucrative, but I would really like to have a look at some actual sales figures to see how it is transpiring on the ground.

Micromax FunBook Tablet

Another common trend that is prevalent for affordable tablets is that almost all of them are based on the Android platform – whether they run the earlier or the more recent versions. In addition to keeping the costs of these tablets very low, it also helps in the sense that most users are quite familiar with it from using their Smartphones, and to be fair, the UI is quite user friendly too.

The concept of affordable tablets is great – and so is the associated vision to usher in universal internet connectivity on its back. However, as the experience with the Government backed Aakash tablet has shown, it will take much more than just low cost to make it happen. Internet connectivity through tablets will also be dependent on cheaper data plans – something that is still not happening beyond Tier 1 cities. What is needed is a coherent overall convergence policy – and the will to implement it to its successful completion.