Apple faces obstacles positioned as iPad Pro for business use

Apple Inc. faces major challenges selling their bigger and more powerful iPad Pro for companies because companies are reluctant to change suppliers of software and the use of an expensive device that lacks specialized business applications, analysts say .

"... They have tried to focus on the company, but in the last two years, really has not been successful," said Daniel Ives, an analyst at FBR Capital Markets. The market for the company, which is how Apple refers to its business customers, representing 10 percent of its $ 183 billion (about Rs. 12,15,736 crore) in annual revenue, he said.

Apple has at least one customer so far: General Electric has given some of its 305,000 employees the option of using Apple devices at work 20,000 60,000 iPads and iPhones now available in their offices. It is unclear how much goes for Apple, or how it generates about $ 18 billion a year in the business market.

Apple officials declined to comment on plans to market iPads business customers, referring queries to a product announcement event happened on September 9 In that case, Phil Schiller, Apple senior vice president of worldwide marketing, He said the iPad Pro was faster than the 80 percent of laptops, indicating that Apple may think the device could replace laptops workplace companies like Dell and HP. Schiller called the "ideal for professional productivity." IPad Pro

Sales of tablets to corporate buyers is an attractive option for Apple amid the global slowdown iPad sales, which have fallen for two quarters. Research firm Forrester expects sales to companies represent up to 20 percent of the total tablet market by 2018, compared with 14 percent this year, as the market grows from 218 million units to 250 million units.

"IPad Pro is important for Apple because they are starting to saturate the device and personal space is a logical step for the company if they want to expand their market share," said Michael Yoshikami, director of Wealth Management destination, which has $ 1.5 billion (about Rs. 9,969 crores) under management and owns Apple shares.

The price of their products is one obstacle Apple faces as it seeks to advance in the business market.

Pro iPad starts at $ 799, but costs more than $ 1,000 if buyers also want a keyboard and an optional stylus. That's more than existing Apple tablets and devices manufactured by Microsoft Corp. and other PC makers like Lenovo. It's about the same price as own Apple MacBook Air, a laptop.

Pro biggest competitor iPad is 12 inches likely Microsoft Surface Pro 3, also facing the business market. While the surface has the same starting price as the iPad Pro, Apple charges extra for a keyboard and stylus.

In July, Microsoft said its line of tablet surface brought $ 888 million (about Rs. 5,900 crore) in the fourth quarter, up 117 percent from the same period last year, driven mostly by the surface Pro 3 and the launch of Area 3.

"The most formidable opposition that adoption is the price ... The iPad Pro has a lot of public services and the technology that Apple exerted but unfortunately the price never goes away as a challenge," said Keith Bachman, an analyst at BMO Capital Markets.

It is also unclear how Apple will expand its sales to businesses as only a few companies like GE have made any significant investment to switch to Apple devices, said JP Gownder, principal analyst at Forrester.

At GE, which gives employees the option of using Apple devices at work, only 10,000 of its 170,000 office workers using computers regularly use a Mac.

Meanwhile, Apple has signed alliances with IBM and Cisco, aimed at creating more business-friendly programs to run on iOS, Apple's operating system, but little is known about these associations.

IPad Pro "is going to be a real accelerator for our association and Apple too," said Katharyn White, vice president of IBM strategy and markets for the company and the association of Apple. "Customers who have seen it and are thinking about it are very excited about it."

A Forrester survey last year of more than 4,000 office workers found that still depend heavily on laptops in the workplace and estimated global information workers are three times more likely to use them during more than four hours tablets per day.

Finally, analysts say that the vast majority of companies use custom applications and databases that are not yet compatible with Apple iOS and is unlikely to switch to Mac devices.

GE has an internal group dedicated to developing applications that can run on mobile devices from Apple, and IBM and Apple are developing a series of iOS applications for enterprise customers in industries ranging from banking to healthcare.

But for most companies, Gownder said, "I still can not run all your business critical applications through Apple." Gownder wrote in a report on Thursday that technology decision makers currently favor Windows over iOS to facilitate assistance by 42 percent to 16 percent.

"Companies have spent billions of applications that are unique to your business and have 40 applications IBM does not change that overnight," he said.