Dell Means Business With Windows Tablet

At an event Tuesday, Dell announced it will be adding a 10-inch Windows 7 based tablet to its product portfolio later this year in a move to appeal to business users.

The company overall announced 24 new business based products including laptops, tablets, desktops and workstation computers at the event, which was held in San Francisco. Along with a new 10-inch, Windows 7-based business-ready tablet, the Round, Rock, Texas-based Dell announced several new versions of its Latitude laptop series, a number of OptiPlex desktops, workstation computers and a convertible tablet.

As a leader in providing business solutions to organizations around the world, we are proud to announce this new portfolio of products that deliver secure, manageable and reliable solutions along with great new designs, Steven Lalla, vice president and general manager of Dell's Commercial Client Product Group, said in a statement.

As the workforce continues to evolve, so will Dell, with the solutions both end-users and IT organizations need to improve efficiency and productivity regardless of the device they choose.

Dell says the new tablet will be designed for end users and IT organizations with a need for greater mobility, a demand for control, security, manageability and integration with existing infrastructure investments. The company did not specify much more than that other than to say it was the cousin of Dell's 10-inch Android tablet, the Streak, which has five and seven inch models. Dell also said it was going to release a 10-inch Android tablet model.

The company debuted several new desktops during the event including a refresh of the OptiPlex series and the Precision Workforce stations. Both desktops will be using Intel processors. Intel's event representative, Rick J. Echevarria, vice president of the company's architecture group, defended PCs saying, Rumors of the death of the PC have been greatly exaggerated.

However, a recent report from IDC may dispute that. It said in the fourth quarter of 2010, more smartphones shipped to customers than PCs for the first time ever. At the same time, Goldman and Barclays cut their PC growth for the upcoming year. Barclays predicted 18 percent growth year-over-year for tablets and only eight percent growth for PCs. Other reports, such as one from Gartner, say the growth of tablets is cutting into the already-slowing growth of PCs.

As the workforce transforms, becoming more mobile and increasingly global, organizations require PC solutions that meet employees' needs for increased flexibility and access while also meeting IT's requirements for manageability and security, Bob O'Donnell, program vice president of IDC's Clients and Displays group, said in a statement.