In all cases the mark Apple has no choice

This could be the story of the snake that bites its tail. With the release of the iPad today in France and eight other countries, Apple has certainly revolutionize the era of digital leisure, but it also takes a risk: to cannibalize some of its own products. If there is little chance that the iPad comes compete with the iPhone (the touch Tablet is not office telephone), he could make the shadow to its iPod players and its Mac computers. In the first case, it is mainly the iPod Touch - iPhone without the phone function - which is intended: it allows to listen to music, play videos, sorting his photos... So many uses that will fill the iPad, even though, with its greater size, it is not a ultramobile product. Earlier this month, a Morgan Stanley survey in the United States showed that 41 of the respondents felt no need to buy an iPod Touch if they invested in the iPad. Moreover, the first returns of sales of the iPad seem to corroborate the trend: in the month of April, iPod sales have plunged by 17 over a year, a record.

But it is also on the segment of the Mac Apple could play the sorcerer's apprentice. The iPad claims indeed experience simple, ergonomic, worthy of a computer, and which could cut the grass under the feet of his Mac Book Air, an ultra-portable PC, released two years ago. "It is naturally a risk because there are two uses which converge strongly," slip Stephen Baker, Vice President for NPD Group, a U.S. analysis firm.

New features

This is not the first time that Apple found in this type of situation. When the firm Apple sells the iPhone in 2007, many analysts predict then the rapid decline of the iPod and the ipod Touch. In the end, the decline was not so terrible. IPod sales have continued to grow through 2008, and began to decrease as from the year last, and slightly (-1.2). "Apple still manages to extend the lifetime of its products through a clever innovation policy" judge Olivier Frigara, specialized journalist, connoisseur of the Apple universe. To avoid the collapse of sales of iPod, Apple has thus introduced new features: colour, touch with iPod Touch, video... "One can imagine that this will be such with the iPad." It will come to compete with other products of the brand only very gradually. "Thus, one may wonder if Apple has not voluntarily flanged desktop potentials of the Tablet so that it comes to confront the Mac", continues Olivier Frigara.

Rise in value anyway

And even if the iPhone and the iPad came one day to replace the iPod Touch, it is not dramatic. "The first to sell more expensive than the second." "The result is that Apple goes up in value, and therefore revenue" Judge Stephen Baker.

In all cases, the mark Apple has no choice. "If Apple does not renew its products, its competitors will take its place: it is better a little chop that Miss a market" continues Stephen Baker.

Essentially, for Apple, is to pursue its policy of diversification of products. In 2005, the Mac and iPod accounted for more than three-quarters of the sales of Apple. In 2009, the landscape is much more diverse, since the Mac weigh about one third of the turnover, followed by the (30,37) iPhone and the iPod (18). Bet Steve Jobs is, therefore, that the iPad is soon the fourth cash cow of the group.

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