Will Android tablets take a bite out of the iPad? Not likely

If you believe the tech press, last week’s IFA show in Berlin was the launching pad for a host of iPad killers — and we all know there’s nothing the tech press loves more than an iSomething killer. But at least one person whose actual business is based on these tablets don’t see any of them replicating the iPad’s runaway success just yet.

Ray Chen, president of Compal, will be building tablet offerings for Acer, Dell, and Lenovo, but as just another cog in the supply chain, he doesn’t appear to feel obliged to engage in any cheerleading; he sees combined non-Apple iPad sales in the 10 to 12 million range in 2011. (That may sound like a lot, but remember that Apple is ramping up iPad production to 3 million units a month.) He also predicts that many players will quit the market after discovering that it isn’t the pot of gold that they imagine.

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But shouldn’t Android-based tablets be following Android phones’ meteoric rise? Well, that depends on what you think the reason for that rise is. Yes, Android’s mobile Web browsing numbers have been rising at iOS’s expense (no doubt you’ve seen this graph a lot over the past few days). But much of that ascent has come simply because the iPhone’s near-total dominance, established over the past few years, couldn’t last in the face of even halfway decent competition, and because Android is available on the United States’ most popular wireless network.

The iPad, by contrast, is still in out-of-the-gate surge mode, and millions of those iPads are Wi-Fi-only models for which the carrier is irrelevant. And Apple’s ability to muscle no-contract 3G connectivity plans out of AT&T shouldn’t be discounted. The much-buzzed-about tablet of the moment, the Samsung Galaxy Tab, will cost $200 to $300, but with a carrier subsidy, which almost guarantees a multiyear contract lock-in. The German Amazon site currently has an unsubsidized version available for the equivalent of more than $1,000. And these prices are for the smaller, 7-inch version, which, you can see at a glance, isn’t quite in the same category as an iPad. How much more will the rumored full-sized version cost?

iSuppli’s assessment of the situation mirrors Chen’s: Apple’s share of the tablet market will dip a bit from near-monopoly today, but the fragmented competition will remain also-rans. iSuppli’s Rhoda Alexander cites the iPad’s “complete integration of hardware, software, operating system, and applications” as a reason for continued iPad success. It’s true that this has always been Apple’s strength across its product lines, and that hasn’t prevented Macs from remaining a niche — albeit a profitable one.

But if the coming round of iPad “killers” can’t beat the iPad in other areas of interest to non-geeks (price, form factor) either, then what is there hope for success? It’s no wonder that Compal’s Chen is looking to compete with Foxconn for iPad-manufacturing contracts.

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