Is the little iPad really the next big thing?

Every inch an iPad. That’s the marketing spiel from the world’s greatest PR-come-tech company – but does Apple’s move to diminutive tablet mark a departure from the company’s once-decisive vision?

That’s how it seems. Many have been quick to lambast the 7.9 inch iPad Mini, with its £269 price tag, as being a move which goes against what the legendary Steve Jobs once believed. Anything smaller than 10”, he said, would be too small to be worthwhile and not really a tablet at all.

Fast forward a couple of years and not only is Apple unveiling a 7” tablet of its own, it’s also revealed a fourth iteration of iPad just seven months after the ‘Resolutionary’ iPad 3. It is, as the Twittersphere puts it, ‘powered by the tears of iPad 3 owners’.

All this comes at a time Amazon’s £159 Kindle and Google’s £199 Nexus 7 tabs make serious inroads into Apple’s territory, carving themselves a slice of the lower end of the market. 

Meanwhile, over in Microsoft land, the Windows boffs are bringing Surface tablets to the table – fully-capable Windows tablets with the flexibility of a PC (hello, SD card slots and USB), while a litany of Windows RT and 8-approved tab makers are prepping a range of tablets and touch-screen laptops.

With Android, too, the likes of Samsung continue to make excellent bits of kit while the Google OS grows better by the update.

Has the rest of the market backed Apple into a corner, forcing it to make desperate moves, to go against its own core beliefs?

Not a bit of it. The company is every inch in control of its own destiny. Whatever you make of the iPad mini u-turn, it’s a clever business move. 

Apple execs are not stupid. They know the lower-end tablets are cannibalizing iPad sales. Presented with a smaller, cheaper alternative, many have sidestepped saving up for a pricey Apple app slab and have plumped for one of the Android machines.

 iPad sales will be hit by smaller tablets. So they mayaswell be Apple tablets that eat into that market share. Don’t want a £400 10” tablet from Apple? Buy the 7”. The company is simply ensuring it has both ends of the market covered, in much the same way the iPhone 4/4S is the cheaper choice compared to iPhone 5.

The price? Yes, it is significantly £90-110 more expensive than its nearest competitors. But it’s got that shiny Apple logo on it. People buy millions more iPods than cheaper MP3 players and the same will be true, to a lesser extent, with tablets.

Apple is as sure of itself, as a company, as ever. The question is, has it done enough to stay top of the pile in an ever-bloodier battle for tech space? 

For now, almost certainly. But – as with the iPhone –  the market may soon demand the wheel be reinvented rather than repackaged.