planning to offer its modern operating system at no cost to manufacturers that make products that retail for $250 and under — the idea, once again, being to boost the adoption of the platform in the mobile world. Rarely do entry level tablets offer an excellent experience, but Microsoft knows that these budget devices sell in high amounts, more so in emerging markets where Android is the dominant platform. One also has to keep in mind that tablets with displays smaller than 9 inches are facing increased competition from phablets and large screen smartphones. And according to the report above, the results are already showing. Several vendors in China that were original working on Android tablets have made the switch to Windows after learning that the platform is becoming free of charge for sub $250 devices. A rough estimate has the number of companies developing Android slates dropping from 70% to 50%, thanks to this announcement. We are yet to hear anything official from Microsoft on this rather interesting development. But if true, it might just be the push that the platform needs. Your thoughts on this?]]>
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Maybe these devices could be made a little bit better with Windows is free
Risk-reward here. Could end up catapulting Windows tablet share, but if they give this away for free and it fails, it will be a huge PR disaster for Redmond to handle. Time will tell.
If a device costs under $250 in the US, you can bet on £250 in the UK. So will the UK version have the price jacked up even higher by having to pay for Windows, since it will be more than $250?