Move over, Apple: Could Barnes & Noble bring Microsoft to college?
Summary: Microsoft's problem is how to get more college students into its stores. What if it can't? Can the company bring its stores to them?
Microsoft invests $300 million into a joint venture with Barnes & Noble, and all it takes away is a Nook application and possibly a new major distribution channel among a highly sought-after demographic.
College students.
Let's face it. College kids want Macs, not Windows-running PCs. There is nothing luxurious or ego-building about owning a PC. It wasn't so long ago I was there; I know the score. PC's are for productivity, and college is mostly about drinking, partying, and climbing the social ladder.
You'll never see a loveable geek fawning over their Windows PC in class --- unless you're Zooey Deschanel --- and even then she's clearly a Mac considering how much she loves using Siri.
Microsoft therefore has a problem. 'How do we get more students using our software and hardware?' Microsoft could to bring the company to the students.
Microsoft Stores are few and far between. Microsoft needs to hit one target for a good source of income: colleges. Many colleges already have Barnes & Noble stores and host within dedicated Tech Stores that offer Nook products and other gadgetry.
Microsoft has 20 U.S. retail store outlets, while Barnes & Noble has over 630 stores at U.S. colleges and universities alone. Microsoft could cheaply infiltrate existing Barnes & Noble stores to offer Windows 8 powered technology directly to the market it seeks to target. With discounts offered upon receipt of college IDs, it increases the chance that students are more likely to head across the quad to the campus store than venture across town for a Mac.
Never underestimate how fickle the mere mortal student can be. Wave shiny things at them at a discounted price tag and they can be easily convinced.
The $300 million investment also means Windows 8 will host its own dedicated e-bookstore to rival Apple and Amazon. One Twitter commenter said: "The idea of spending $250-800 on a Windows 8 tablet that can get discounted e-textbooks sounds amazing as a student."
If Microsoft wanted to run with this, discounted Windows PCs could open the floodgates to a vast online e-bookstore that could offer cheaper e-books than its rivals. It would guarantee Barnes & Noble a stable revenue stream and a good market share, while batting at Apple and Amazon in the academic space. In return, Microsoft could at most ask for a reasonable and fair cut of the profits. Everybody would win.
But it's not just about academia and college. It's about the entire student experience. Windows has lost its branding edge with the younger generation, and its not limited to the Windows operating system.
iPhones dominate the student market. Android has the enterprise and consumer market sewn up, but students still vie for iPhones and BlackBerrys, despite RIM's ailing brand. Microsoft has 3.9 percent of the U.S. mobile market share market, according to recent comScore figures, and it continues to fall month by month.
It's time for Microsoft to get the whole ecosystem package going: Windows PCs with Windows 8, and Windows Phones and Xbox 360's. Who needs Pages, Keynote and Numbers when you have Office 2010 resting in your Start menu?
Microsoft declined to comment, but it would not be unexpected to see a rapid college campus expansion in the coming few years.
Image credit: Wikimedia Commons, CC.
Related:
- Microsoft and Barnes & Noble settle patent dispute; create new subsidiary
- Is there a Windows-based Barnes & Noble reader in the works?
- Will Barnes & Noble and Nook usher in a $199 Windows Metro tablet?
- comScore: RIM, Microsoft face mobile market share crisis
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Talkback
Huge Disconnect.
Depends. Which class are you talking about? I see students comparing PC specs in class all the time.
"Lets face it. College kids want Macs, not Windows-running PCs. There is nothing luxurious or ego-building about owning a PC."
Again, I disagree. There are students on my campus who won't go near a Mac... Many feel quite proud of their machines.
"It wasnt so long ago I was there; I know the score. "
I'm there now. :)
But that's not the point of this blog. All I want to say is that I'm hopeful for some kind of hardware/software collaboration.
Our campus bookstore is actually a Barnes and Noble store. To have access to that kind of collaboration will be most welcoming. I have expressed interest in a low-powered HP 500-like slate running the newest ATOM chip, and Windows 8. To be able to trade in physical books, for digital books would be a godsend.
I think you meant "won't go near a Mac" in one of the
Pagan jim
Thank you.
And it's not just the "gamers" out there. I genuinely feel as if may students are proud of their machines. I see about two PCs per one Apple device on my campus at any given time, especially when you're in the classes I take, then it's all PCs.
I think the tech press forgets they're wearing Apple colored glasses every now and then.
"There is nothing luxurious or ego-building"
Except for the rational of applying "artistic license", how do you justify
Apple earning, 2Q12: 5 enterprise takeaways by Andrew Nusca (April 25)
Apple sells 645,000 devices a day during Q2 by Adrian Kingsley-Hughes (April 25)
Five reasons why iPad and iPhone are THE choices for BYOD by Ken Hess (April 29)
BTW, Zack, I noticed that you carefully avoided expressing your own preferences on this blog topic.
I seem to recall that as a University student you expressed, on more than one Holiday shopping list, a distinct aversion towards a tablet purchase.
And that on more than one occasion as a student, you advised against using a tablet platform as a substitute for traditional paper based text books.
In fact, as a student, I think it is fair to state that your ideas expressed in your ZDNet published works were absolutely opposite from the philosophy expressed by your Twitter reference. (The idea of spending $250-800 on a Windows 8 tablet that can get discounted e-textbooks sounds amazing as a student.) Of course, your published words would have substituted "Apple's iPad" for "Windows 8 tablet" when comparing your past thoughts on this topic to that Twitter reference.
Personally, if a University Student wishes to purchase a Windows 8 tablet as a e-text book reading platform, I would recommend that it have a "Retina capable display". Trust me, after spendings many hours reading text on all three iPad models, that retina display does make a difference. I'm sure that "someone" will manufacture a Windows 8 tablet someday with a comparable display. That would be the tablet I'd recommend for someone wishing to embrace the Microsoft ecosystem.
Finally, it's just curiosity that prompts me to ask if you still hold to your student's opinions on e-text books used on a tablet platform. Or tablets (iPad and any other makes) as being a poor choice for a University Student purchase decision.
If your answer is different from your student opinions than I wouldn't be surprised. Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) once told the following tale. (To paraphrase) As a teenager, Mark Twain - speaking for himself - thought his dad was the dumbest person in the world. After Mark reached the age of 21, he was amazed to discover just how much his dad had learned in five years! I suspect that you might say that after a few years, you will be amazed at just how much ZDNet talkback commenters have discovered in such a short time. Grin.
I especially liked "PC???s are for productivity" myth
....
If...
Microsoft start selling Windows Smartphones and tablets
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