iPads account for 91 per cent of the enterprise tablet market, rising to 98 per cent in Fortune 500 companies, and 95 per cent of the education tablet market, according to Apple. The figures were delivered as part of the company's Q2 2014 earnings announcement.
In the four years since Apple launched the iPad, over 210 million units have been sold, a figure which Apple CEO Tim Cook pointed out was twice as many as the number of iPhones sold and seven times the number of iPods sold. Of the iPad's 91 per cent share of the tablet market, Cook was particularly satisfied.
"This is an astonishing number and many of those enterprises are writing apps that are key proprietary apps for running that business," Cook is reported as saying in a Seeking Alpha transcript. "This is great… because they're more productive as a result of that."
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Luca Maestri, Apple's vice president of finance and corporate controller, provided some examples of how iPads are being used in business.
In addition to daily use by Fedex and a planned deployment by the US Department of Veterans Affairs, Maestri detailed a 20,000 strong roll-out of iPads at US pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly, where a total of 50 internal apps are also used with the devices as part of a laptop replacement program.
Cook also explained that he felt iPads would remain dominant in the education market. "The focus in education is on penetration, is on getting more schools to buy," he said. "My belief is the match has been lit, and it's very clear to the educators that have studied this, is that student achievement is higher with iPad in the classroom than without it."
According to Maestri, a recent ChangeWave survey found that two-thirds of people planning to purchase a tablet within 90 days plan to buy an iPad.
