Jim Turner has bought 15 iPads that he’ll get in April, when Apple starts shipping the tablet-style computer designed for book reading, game playing, and video viewing. Yet Turner won’t be using the iPad for entertainment.
“It’s for business,” says Turner, who runs Hilltop Consultants, a provider of information technology services to law firms and other companies in the Washington [D.C.] area. Turner says he’ll use the computer for checking e-mail on the go and taking notes while setting up client computer systems.
The iPad, billed by Apple executives as a digital book reader, video player, and gaming platform, isn’t just for fun and games. Many companies and employees are buying the iPad to use it as a tool for business-related communications and keeping employees productive while they’re on the go, says Charlie Wolf, an analyst at Needham & Co. “Clearly, the iPad has a role to play in the business market,” says Wolf, who has a buy rating on Apple stock. “The demand appears to be far more diverse than I originally expected.”
More than half of mobile-phone users surveyed recently by Zogby International said they would use a tablet device such as the iPad for working outside the office, according to mobile software maker Sybase, which commissioned the survey of 2,443 adult cell-phone users.
Of respondents, 52.3 percent said they would most likely use a tablet for work, compared with 48.2 percent who said they’d use an iPad-like device for watching movies and TV, and 35.4 percent who said they’d play games on their tablet. The findings reflect “unexpected emphasis on the iPad’s suitability for work-related activities, and the iPad’s potential value to information workers,” Dublin [Calif.]-based Sybase said in a Mar. 23 statement.
iWork Software for the iPad
Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs and other officials of the Cupertino [Calif.]-based company…