Microsoft News: How to charge for Windows 8 system?

US technology blog BusinessInsider today announced the registration of Dan · Dan Frommer's article said that Microsoft needs to reform the existing software licensing model in order to get rich in the iPad-led tablet market. income. He also gave some ideas of his own ideas and analyzed them. The following is the full text of the article:
Changes in the landscape
Microsoft's Windows department is still very large: in the past year, the department achieved operating profit of 12 billion US dollars, achieving revenue of 19 billion US dollars. The reason for such excellent performance is that Microsoft still dominates the PC operating system market, and the cumulative license of Windows 7 has exceeded 400 million.
But as the industry's development focus gradually shifts to the tablet market, Microsoft's prospects may face more uncertainty. With the slowdown in economic growth and the price advantage of tablet PCs, how can Microsoft build a growth business? Perhaps Windows 8 needs to explore new models, otherwise it may have a blind eye to shrinking business.
In the field of iPad-led tablets, Microsoft is not only late, but also needs to start from scratch, whether it is software or channels. It is no wonder that the company has lost its previous advantages. For the Windows business, this is not good news.
Today, every time a user buys a Windows 7 PC, Microsoft can earn between $50 and $100, depending on the vendor, region, and version. The key is that this unit has a high income and equipment sales are also large.
But for iPad challengers who sell for only $500 or less, paying a $50 to $100 Windows license fee per device is obviously out of place. Especially when tablet manufacturers choose "free" Android operating system to replace Windows.
Small income
So how much should Microsoft charge? Maybe 20 or 30 dollars per device? Even less? This means that even if Microsoft partners can sell 25 to 50 million tablets in a few years. —— This is already a huge success —— Microsoft's revenue is only about $1 billion.
Since Microsoft’s revenue in the past 12 months is close to $70 billion, it’s difficult for $1 billion in revenue to boost its growth, not to mention PC business continues to shrink, while Apple still dominates the tablet market. leading. If Microsoft can stay behind and seize the dominant position in the tablet market, the situation will be completely different, but the possibility is small.
This is the charm of Apple's iPad business, which sells a complete set of software and hardware, and gradually began to increase its reliance on its own retail kingdom. Apple is really closed and will not license the operating system to dozens of vendors like Microsoft. But all product sales are pocketed by the company, and the profit per device is likely to reach hundreds of dollars.
Apple has earned more than $16 billion in revenue over the past year with the iPad, almost as much as the Microsoft Windows division, despite a slightly lower profit margin. If Apple can sell 50 million tablets in a year, it will achieve more than $30 billion in revenue, equivalent to 30 times the authorized revenue of Microsoft Windows tablets.
Solution Analysis
So how can Microsoft build a tablet into a more profitable business?
- Microsoft can follow Apple and bundle hardware and software. But Microsoft is not good at hardware, and the Kin phone is a good example. And this move may alienate HP's (microblogging), Dell (microblogging) and other partners. In addition, given the current economic situation, this may not be worthwhile.
- Microsoft can also copy the strategy of the desktop market to the tablet field and get extra income through Office. But Apple has already taken steps to suppress Office, the company's full suite of iWork office software for only $30 in the iPad App Store, and a single app for $10. This will definitely have an impact on Microsoft. Moreover, tablet users do not necessarily need Office.
- Although Microsoft can get sales share through the Windows 8 app store, this revenue will not be too much, and the profit margin is usually not high. Apple's iTunes is currently in a state of balance, and its purpose is to drive real money-making hardware sales.
- Microsoft can also generate revenue through various cloud computing services. But Apple's iCloud has been preemptive, and other existing services have already kept prices down.
- Both Tablet Apps and Bing can bring advertising revenue to Microsoft, but the per capita and annual average amount will not be too high.
- Microsoft may be able to use its tablet to attract users to continue to purchase Windows PCs and the full version of Office to protect existing businesses. But how to deploy it?
These are just some of my personal thoughts, which may be flawed, but Microsoft seems to need some novel models, otherwise Windows 8 tablets will be difficult to develop well in the iPad-led tablet world. .