I’m finding it more and more difficult to read Origami-related content now. We’ve just about analysed those little boxes to death and we’re all coming up with the same negative conclusions again and again.
To me, Project Origami has been a success.
Despite the thousands of blogs and posts that complain about battery life and size. Its been a success.
Despite it getting a slating from Gartner. Its been a success.
Despite there being not a single sale yet. Its been a success.
For AMD, its been a success. For Nokia, Its been a success and for Microsoft its been a success.
Why?
Becuase I have never, in my internet life (18 years now) seen so many people analysing a market segment and then coming up with such a simlar conclusion. A real united opinion about a new market segment. I don’t even need to list the details here because most readers will have already analysed the requirements down to the last flip-out stand. There’s very few disagreements out there and thats a first. Even the OS X, Linux and XP argument seems to be quiet becuase everyone seems to understand that we’re talking about a device segment here in which all flavors of OS are going to fit.
Origami has been a success becuase its generated probably tens of thousands of blog comments, dozens of new websites and forums and an absolute gold-mine of ideas, analysis and wish-lists. And for the first time ever, the product manager just has to line up 50-100 RSS feeds and spend an hour to come up with a succesful product description.
The Origami team missed the mark with their first release. But I think they knew that was going to happen anyway. I think they’d taken manufacturers through to a point of no-return and decided to test the market with what they’d got. That something was pretty much the best that thermal physics would let them achieve for the given price bracket.
OK, one could argue that they shouldn’t have gone with the viral marketing campaign but I think that was a genuine mistake. The year-old promo video that was found just pushed the buzz beyond expectation. At least it shows that people are genuinly interested in it!
Compare that Origami buzz we saw to the Windows Vista buzz. Its totally different I dont know a single end-user thats excited about Vista. Vista doesnt have a hungry audience. Origami and the ultra mobile PC space seems to.
We’re in a race now. Every product manager who could possibly bring something into the ultra mobile PC market now knows what specifications are needed. They now know what their target customer is. Knows how important style is and knows where to price it for success. They also know that there’s a good number of customers waiting for the first product that matches the criteria. Don’t be suprised if someone takes the plunge and brings out a loss-leading device in order to grab the first big market share.
Who will it be? Will Microsoft force some heavy discounting or bundling? Will Nokia speed up development? Does AMD have partners its already working with? Are Apple or Sony working on something? Or how about one of the smaller companies? Pepperpad? Flybook? How about all the pocket-pc dev teams sitting round tables trying to find a quick way to repackage their product into the ultra mobile PC market. Or will someone take a different approach and hide the cost in a subscription package? There’s plenty of TV channels and video content out there waiting to be received via a digital TV receiver or online stream
I don’t really care how it manifests itself. I’m just excited at the prospect of many new devices appearing in the next 12 months and basking in a sea of luxury decisions. I just feel sorry for all those ultra mobile PC product managers out there that won’t get any sleep for the next year.
Keywords: umpc, origami
V1.0. 22nd March 2006.
