Color me pessimistic, but I saw this one coming a mile away. Sony has decided to can the Xperia Z5 Tablet series, on account of having to focus on the fresh “One Sony” strategy. Tablets aren’t doing well, we knew that much, between Google removing them from the Android.com site and IDC’s figures. Now Sony is also throwing the towel.
Previously and earlier this year we had some leaks and speculations about two versions of the Xperia Z5 Tablet. The core one was supposed to have a 10 inch screen, while the Xperia Z5c Tablet was all about the smaller 8 inch panel. I also expected some gaming from the little one, via a joystick attachment. Specs were a bit of mystery, but a Snapdragon 835 or Snapdragon 845 was a pretty sure inclusion.
As recent reports showed unimpressive Xperia XZ2 sales and Sony Mobile is trying to make a turnaround, tablets were victims of the new strategy. Sony cancelled the whole tablet series and they may have well given up on the Xperia Tablet series for good. Their last model in the series was the Xperia Z4 Tablet back in 2015, a device that people probably forgot about already.
Sony announced plans recently to turn its mobile unit into a profitable business by 2020, by streamlining the product portofolio. This involves cuts and sacrifices and tablets are the ones to “suffer”. With the iPad ruling, Samsung and Huawei still big on the Android market and Lenovo and Amazon picking up the rest of the pie, there’s not much room here to compete.
