comScore surveys tablet buyer demographics and reasons for buying

comScore has released its first comScore TabLens report, a monthly survey covering U.S. tablet ownership and usage. The survey consists of a three-month rolling sample of 6,000 U.S. tablet owners. The first report covers tablet buyer demographics and reasons for purchasing. Here's a summary of the findings:

• Overall, tablet ownership is split exactly 50% men/50% women, with heaviest ownership in the 25-34 year old age group and with respondents whose household income is $100K/year or more.
• iPad owners are more heavily male (52.9% male/$47.1% female).
• Kindle Fire owners are more heavily female (56.6% female/43.4% male).
• Owners of other Android tablets are slightly more male than female (50.9% male/49.1% female).
• Owners of all three kinds of tablets have a similar distribution of age groups and household income, except that the iPad has more owners with $100K or greater household income than the other two tablets (46.3% for the iPad, vs. 33.3% for the Kindle Fire and 32.5% for other Android tablets.)
• The most important factors for buyers of the iPad are 1) Selection of apps, 2) Brand name of the tablet, and 3) The tablet's operating system.
• For Kindle Fire buyers, the three most popular factors are 1) The price of the tablet, 2) Selection of apps, and 3) Brand name of the tablet, and music and video capabilities (tie).
• For other Android tablet buyers, the three most popular factors are 1) The price of the tablet, 2) The tablet's operating system, and 3) Selection of apps.
• The iPad had the highest overall device satisfaction (8.8 out of 10), followed by the Kindle Fire (8.7) and other Android tablets (8.2).

iPad's market share increased in Q2, Android's share flat on higher shipments

TechCrunch reports on Strategy Analytics' Q2 tablet shipment report. iPad shipments increased to 17 million units in Q2 2012 from 9.3 million units in Q2 2011, while Android tablet shipments were 7.3 million units in Q2 2012 vs. 4.4 million in Q2 2011. Microsoft-based tablet shipments fell from 600,000 units in Q2 2011 to 300,000 in Q2 2012, as did "Others" (primarily the RIM PlayBook,) which fell from 700,000 in Q2 2011 to 300,000 in Q2 2012.

In terms of market share, Apple's share increased from 62% to 68.3%, while Android's share stayed flat at 29.3% despite the increase in units shipped. Microsoft's share dropped from 4% to 1.2%, and "Others" dropped from 4.7% to 1.2% Total tablet shipments grew 68.8% year-over-year.

Google says that the Nexus 7 went from inception to launch in four months

Engadget has an interview with Patrick Brady, Google's Director of Android Partner Engineering. In it, Brady says that the Nexus 7 tablet project actually took just four months from inception to launch. Google and Asus started with a prototype tablet that Asus previewed at the Consumer Electronics Show last January (that model was scheduled to sell for $250.) Development began in late February. The tablet was made thinner and lighter than the prototype, and some features were dropped to lower the cost, including a rear-facing camera. (Brady didn't confirm that the camera was dropped because of cost, but the January Asus prototype had one.) Brady said that the Nexus 7 is just the "first device" in the Nexus tablet range.

Tablets now generate more eCommerce traffic than smartphones

As more evidence that tablets are overtaking smartphones as devices of preference for mobile Internet users, GigaOm reports on a new study of more than 100 million online shopping transactions by Monetate. The company determined that tablets represented 6.52% of traffic to eCommerce sites in Q1 2012, overtaking smartphones (with 5.35%) for the first time. Tablet traffic increased 348% in the last year, while smartphone traffic increased 117%. 95% of the tablet traffic was from iPads. These numbers compare with a forecast from Adobe that overall tablet traffic worldwide won't exceed that from smartphones until early 2013, and will represent 10% of website traffic in early 2014. GigaOm suggests that the reason for the difference between Monetate and Adobe is that Monetate measures eCommerce traffic, while Adobe is counting all traffic, including traffic to content sites.

Tablets are also much more efficient at converting sales than smartphones: In Q1, visits from PCs converted into sales 3.51% of the time, while visits from tablets converted at a 3.23% rate, and visits from smartphones converted at a 1.39% rate. Other measures, such as pages viewed per session and items added to carts, are also much closer between PCs and tablets than between either PCs or tablets and smartphones. The reasons most likely are the bigger displays and keyboards on tablets.

Promethean introduces its table-sized tablet just as Microsoft distances itself from its version

MindShift reports that Promethean has just introduced a table with an integrated 46" touchscreen LCD for classroom use called the ActivTable. Up to six students can interact with the device at the same time, and Promethean offers a collection of "activities" designed for four- to 11-year-old children. The ActivTable will sell for $8,000; adding the entire suite of interactive tools can cost as much as $4,000 more.

Promethean's timing is a little off: Microsoft launched a table computer called Surface (yes, that's where the company got the name for its new tablets) in 2008. Samsung took over production of a second-generation version of the device this year, and the same day that Microsoft announced its Surface tablets, it quietly renamed the table computer to PixelSense. The original Surface computer has found a few customers, but by and large, it (and Samsung's version) have been seen as overpriced toys. (Samsung's SUR40 is priced at $8,400.)

If Microsoft's table/computer had ever gotten much market traction, it wouldn't have been possible for the company to adopt its Surface brand name for its new tablets without causing a great deal of market confusion. Given Microsoft's experience, and at its $8,000 price, Promethean's ActivTable is going to have a steep uphill battle for sales.

LG to Sideline Tablet Development to Focus on Smartphones

Bloomberg reports that South Korea's LG Electronics has decided to "to put all new tablet development on the back burner for the time being in order to focus on smartphones,” according to company spokesperson Ken Hong. LG denied that Microsoft's announcement of its new Surface tablets was a factor in the company's decision. LG sells Android tablets, but their sales have been poor, so it's not a surprise that the company is pulling back until it becomes clear if, and how, other companies can successfully (and profitably) compete with the iPad.

Google and Asus expected to unveil 7" Nexus tablet next week at Google I/O

DigiTimes reports that Google's and Asus' new 7" Nexus Android tablet, to be built for the companies by Quanta Computer (the same company that manufactures the Kindle Fire,) will be launched at next week's Google I/O Conference in San Francisco. The price will reportedly be $199, and the tablet is said to include a quad-core Tegra 3 processor and a front-facing webcam. DigiTimes also says that the tablet will be preloaded with Google's Chrome browser for Android; it's not clear if Chrome will replace or be installed in addition to the legacy Android browser.

Tablet use by mobile phone users almost quadrupled in one year

comScore has released some findings from its forthcoming TabLens report on the U.S. tablet market. Here's a summary from the press release:

• Mobile phone users (ages 13+) who also use a tablet almost quadrupled from April 2011 (4.7%) to April 2012 (16.5%). 
• Smartphone users who use tablets increased from 9.7% in April 2011 to 23.6% in April 2012. 
• Feature phone users who use tablets increases from 2.3% in April 2011 to 10.4% in April 2012. 
• Women are slightly heavier users of tablets (50.8% vs. 49.2% for men,) while men are slightly heavier users of smartphones (51.6% vs. 48.4% for women.) 
• Tablet users tend to be significantly older than smartphone users: The heaviest concentration of users of both devices is between the ages of 25 and 44, but tablet users were 28% more likely to be ages 65 and over, and 27% less likely to be ages 18 to 24. 
• 56% of tablet users have an income of at least $75,000/year, compared to 49.3% of smartphone owners. 
• Tablet owners are nearly three times as likely to watch videos on their devices as are smartphone owners--20% of smartphone users said that they'd watched a video on their device in the month of the survey, compared to 53% of tablet owners, and heavy video watchers were more than three times as likely to have watched a video every day on tablets (9.5%) than on smartphones (2.9%).

Speculation: The game any number can play

Late last week, TechCrunch's MG Siegler reported that he had not only gotten his eyes on a prototype of a new Amazon tablet, but his hands as well. He reported many details about the hardware and software, the price, when it will be announced, and even what kinds of promotions Amazon plans for it. Siegler's story triggered a flood of speculative articles, all primarily based on his description. For example:

• From Forbes:  Amazon Can Become Tablet King With E-Commerce Underwriting
• From The Wall Street Journal: Amazon.com Says It Is Testing Website Redesign (Changes, Which Will Roll Out Gradually, Were Made With Tablet Computers In Mind)
• From Wireless World: Amazon's $249 tablet could shake up pay TV business

I take Siegler at his word that he saw and used a prototype of an Amazon tablet, and that he spoke with a source with inside information about Amazon's plans. However, we have no independent verification that the tablet he used is representative of the final product, or that the pricing, availability and promotional details that he got are correct and won't change by the time the product finally ships. Nor do we have any independent verification of what he wrote about a second tablet, or about Amazon's plans for other black & white Kindles.

It's easy (and fun for the whole family) to base articles on a single, unconfirmed story, but they take as fact what is only rumor and hearsay. The problem with piling speculation on top of hearsay is obvious: If the hearsay is incorrect, the speculation based on it is even more incorrect, and the whole pile tumbles down like a badly-constucted Jenga tower.

We know what TechCrunch published. Let's get some independent confirmation of the facts before we start drawing conclusions or determining what the impact will be on the industry. If Siegler is correct, we don't have long to wait before we get confirmation from Amazon itself. There's plenty of time to determine the implications of Amazon's actions once we know the "true facts".

Kno announces prices for its eBook readers

Kno, the Chegg spinoff that plans to rent college eTextbooks, has announced prices for its two eBook readers. The single-screen model will be priced at $599, and the dual-screen model will be $899. A limited number of readers, manufactured for Kno by Foxconn, will be available by the end of the year. Kno plans to test its readers and rental program at ten unnamed U.S. colleges and universities.

Kno's single-tablet pricing isn't too far from the price of the equivalent iPad, which has become the de facto industry benchmark. However, the Kno readers have a very different set of use cases than the iPad. Kno's devices are designed to provide as close of an electronic substitute as possible for the experience of using printed textbooks, so they have big screens that can fit most textbooks in current use on the screen at full scale. Students can take notes and highlight with a stylus, or use their fingers. They're not general-purpose devices like the iPad or notebook computers.

Kno claims that their rental program will cover the cost of their single-screen tablet in three semesters. However, the question is whether students want an expensive dedicated eBook reader at all, or if they can live with the smaller screen of the iPad and similar devices. I think that most students will go with the iPad. They'll get a ligher, easier-to-carry device, an enormous selection of apps and a choice of eBook vendors, rather than being locked into Kno.

Kno started developing their eBook reader well before the iPad was announced. If they had waited until the iPad was available, I suspect that they would have chosen to support the iPad and other tablets rather than building their own. If Kno's eBook readers don't get market traction quickly, they may be forced to alter their strategy and support other devices.