Acer VP: Surface likely to damage MS partner relationships
updated 06:00 pm EDT, Sun June 24, 2012
Business focus, Windows 8 launch problems feared
Oliver Ahrens, Acer's senior VP and Europe president, has declared Microsoft's secretive Surface line of tablets doomed to failure. Specifically citing business focus issues and a change in core business principles, Ahrens urged Acer's primary software partner to focus on Windows 8 and pre-existing business arrangements instead of the potentially-risky product launch. "Microsoft is working with two dozen PC vendors worldwide, including the local guys, whereas Apple is alone, it can more or less do what it wants," Ahrens said when further questioned about potential problems with the tablet.
Ahrens continued by adding "Microsoft is a component of a PC system. A very important component, but still a component." He was also concerned that resources would shift from Windows 8 development to building consumer hardware with the associated demands on retail, with the result of losing focus on Windows 8 and the rest of the PC industry. "Instead of enhancing the user experience for Win 8 ... they open a new battlefield," Ahrens added. "I worry that this will lead into a defocus internally for Microsoft, and then we have to suffer because we are working with their products."
In a move similar to Apple's back in at the beginning of this century when G4 processor speeds fell behind equivalent offerings from Intel, Acer is now building an advertising campaign focused on the user experience with Windows 8 and its hardware, rather than performance and specifications. "Acer wants to be more about value than volume," Ahrens said.
Ahrens' statements may be self-serving rather that a realistic prognostication. A failure to properly launch Windows 8 is likely to have significant repercussions on both the future advertising campaign, and the sales of future Acer Windows 8-dependent products. The Microsoft Surface line of tablets can also be expected to cause some cannibalization of Acer's Iconia Tab A and Tab W-series Android-based tablet sales.
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Nov 2008
It doesn't take a genius to figure
that much out. Microsoft is probably doing this just to jumpstart Windows 8 tablets with their reference models, but if Microsoft is able to sell their own tablets by the millions cheaper than their partners, there could be some serious fallout. I'm sure Microsoft must realize that those partners also sell desktops and notebooks and it's not as if Microsoft can do without partners buying OEM licenses by the millions. I don't believe Microsoft is going to seriously pursue its own branding of computing devices apart from these tablets and maybe Microsoft is only intending to sell a limited number of ZunePads. It still seems like a risky move to backstab the partners and not even letting them know about it beforehand.