Tablets are the New Gaming and Video Platform

Any brand-new consumer electronics category will feature some new lead app, feature and use case. For the iPod it was music, for the iPod Touch it arguably has been games and web apps. For the new category of tablets, it appears games and video consumption actually are emerging as the lead apps, even though tablets continue to be used for some business applications and light consumer computing tasks as well.

Wi-Fi remains the connection of choice. AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson says half a million tablets on the AT&T network had active 3G connections. But something on the order of three million tablets get sold each quarter.

For most consumer products, price remains the single most important factor in consumers’ purchase decisions. But tablets appear to have been somewhat different in the early going, largely because of the early adopter profile of most Apple iPad buyers. 

Price ranks fourth among purchase considerations in one survey by NPD Group. Only 77 percent of potential tablet buyers say price factors very highly in their purchase decision. Click images for a larger view. 

Yankee Group : Research Report