Acer says it does not want to be a guinea pig.
The company has decided to push back its plans to launch a Windows RT tablet until the second quarter of 2013.
In an interview with Reuters, company president Jim Wong said that it is going to first see how Microsoft’s own proprietary hardware does in the market before it makes a final determination on how to approach its entry into the market.
Specifically, Wong said, “I don’t know what’s next, what Microsoft will do. We are watching how Surface is doing … How is RT accepted by customers… We don’t know… We want to see.”
Microsoft’s Surface tablet was just released a few days ago and there is no clear indication that it was a massive success. But few people were expecting the device to be an instant iPad rival.
The real question is whether or not the platform has staying power. This is part of Microsoft’s grand strategy to tie all of its products and services together, and also to get customers to make sure every kind of device or service they use is powered by Microsoft’s platform.
So even though you might not have access to all the iPad apps on a Windows RT tablet, Microsoft thinks having connectivity to things like your Xbox Live account and instant messaging services, emails, etc, is a more valuable benefit.
We’ll see how it does. Just like Acer.
