APPLE FANS queued overnight at stores to get their hands on the new iPad, which went on sale yesterday in 10 countries.
Apple announced the new iPad, seen as an evolution of the existing iPad 2, on March 7th, with chief executive Tim Cook talking up Apple’s position in the “post-PC era”.
To tempt consumers into upgrading, the company packed in quad-core graphics, a better camera, high definition video and a higher resolution display, similar to that found in the iPhone. It has put the updated version of its tablet device on sale in a select number of countries in a first wave of a phased roll-out, including the United States, Canada, Singapore, France and Britain. Irish consumers will have to wait to get their hands on the tablet, due on sale here on March 23rd.
Diehards lined up overnight in front of Apple stores in Munich, Paris, London, Singapore and Hong Kong. Crowds were down on previous Apple launches, but there was still excitement as stores opened.
David Tarasenko, a 34-year-old construction manager who was the first to pick up the iPad at a Telstra store in Sydney at midnight, said ever since Mr Cook had revealed the tablet’s third iteration, he hadn’t been able to wait to get one. “When Tim Cook announced it, it sounded like such a magical tool. I just got hyped into it, I guess,” he said.
In London, 21-year-old Piotr, who works at noodle bar Wagamama, said: “It’s not for me, it’s to sell. I will bring them to Russia to sell them.”
In the Chinese city of Shenzhen, people keen to get their hands on the new iPad waited for them to be smuggled across the border from Hong Kong. “We don’t have iPads yet but some will arrive later in the day when the students deliver them to us. We’ll have more supplies over this weekend,” said a store operator in the city.
“Customs has become stricter, but if you take one at a time across the border, that’s still pretty safe. At most they’ll ask you to take it out of the box to prove that it’s for self use.”
Hype building ahead of the iPad sales pushed shares to record highs, with Apple stock reaching the $600 mark. It peaked half an hour after the first iPad went on sale in Australia, extending the market worth of the world’s most valuable company to almost $560 billion (€425 billion).
Apple has sold about 55 million iPads since their launch by the late Steve Jobs in 2010.
Research firm Gartner says sales of the devices could grow to 326 million by 2015. Apple is expected to retain its position as leader of the market, although it faces increasingly tough competition. The iPad competes with Samsung’s Galaxy, among others, which uses Google’s Android operating system. – (additional reporting: Reuters)
