When AAPL first came out with the iPAD a few years back I was perplexed at one glaring "fault" and was convinced it would not be a hit. Turns out I was wrong of course and this glaring fault was overwhelmed by the beauty of the design, the functionality and the legions of Apple fans who could now view their tunes, photos, vidoes and Apps on a proper screen. But I believe that as competitors understand what Apple has done with design and functionality and mimic it, Apple's "glaring omission" from its iPADs will become a serious weakness in the market. I am talking about the lack of a UBS or other port via which to upload or download files to and from the iPAD. Suppose I am travelling and want to download photos from my camera to the iPAD (I choose this time to travel with this instead of my laptop). No go. I need to find an internet cafe with itunes on a computer, and even then, its not synched with my iPAD so I am stuck. Apple's insistance to its iphone and iPAD users that they can only control these devices through itunes installed on a computer will, I believe, ultimately cause customer defection as competitors match Apple's hardware and software functionality. A combo to watch carefully is the anticipated tie up of Windows 8 with Nokia's hardware in the form of a tablet. Although not due to market for at least 6 months, it may be the first iPAD killer. It will come equip with a UBS port, no restrictions on what users can or cannot load on to it (why is APPLE telling us what movies, books, tunes or other content we can load on our device??), the full force of MS's app developers (over 1 billion users and the world's largest population of app programmers). Crucially, it will come armed with tablet versions of Excel, Word, Powerpoint, Outlook and other familar apps known to almost all computer users the world over. It will transform what is essentially a very elegant consumer toy into a mission critical enterprise mobility tool, and I believe, transform the workplace in the same way RIMM first did with the Blackberry. NOK remains the world's largest mobile phone maker with huge economies of scale and distribution the world over. Microsoft remains the largest vendor of enterprise software. The enterprise device market remains 5-6 times larger than the consumer market, and it does not take a leap of faith to see that given APPL's insistence on maintaining (against customer needs and desires) an ironlike grip on its ecosystem and what one is allowed to put on its devices a viable alternative which overcomes these issues AND delights the consumer with design (which NOK has done countless times in the past and recently with its LUMINA phone) AND which has the backing and customer reach of the world's largest business software vendor WILL steal share. NOK is currently worth 18 billion USD, Apple 515 billion. Both sell similar numbers of devices although AAPL's sales are double NOKs. I realise PE and margins are what determine the shareprice, but given the above developments I know where I would place my bets going into 2013. I am long NOK 2013 Call options.
Disclosure: I am long NOK.