As netbooks gain market share, industry observers have been asking if Apple is going to jump into this product category. According to The Wall Street Journal, the company may be preparing to do just that — with the guidance of CEO Steve Jobs.
Quoting “people familiar with the matter,” the Journal reported that Jobs, officially out on medical leave until June, continues to work from home on product strategies, reviews and plans, including the user interface of the newest version of the iPhone operating system. Jobs was treated for pancreatic cancer in 2004, and took a medical leave early this year because of complications from a “hormone imbalance.”
10-inch Screens
The Journal said Apple is working not only on new iPhone models, but on a portable device that fits between the iPhone/iPod touch on one hand, and the company’s laptop computers on the other. By most definitions, this might end up in the netbook category.
Netbooks are responsible for “virtually all unit sales growth in PCs,” said Ross Rubin, director of industry analysis for consumer technology at the NPD Group. “Apple has a large product price gap between the iPod touch and the lower-end MacBook,” he noted, and that’s where a netbook could fit nicely.
The talk about Apple developing a netbook has also been prompted by a report from Reuters in March that Apple is taking delivery in the third quarter of new, 10-inch touchscreens from a Taiwanese manufacturer, Wintek. Wintek has refused to comment. The news service also quoted Taiwan media as saying that Quanta Computer, based there, would make the actual mini-PCs under contract to Apple.
‘Some Functional Separation’
But although netbooks are hot in an otherwise cold landscape, they have their downside for manufacturers, such as reducing margins. But, Rubin pointed out, Apple is sacrificing some market share by not participating in…