IDG Contributor Network: Microsoft Surface: Saving the future of PCs

[Disclosure: The companies mentioned in this article are clients of the author.]

For some time now, the PC market has been partially operating backward. Intel, who built the heart of the PC, would create a product then toss it out to the OEMs…who then had to build around it. This is analogous to having an automotive engine company building what they want – say a 16-cylinder engine – and having the car manufacturers build around it.

The way most manufacturing works is the engineers designing the product come up with a spec for a major component, and the component maker builds the part to the spec. This process is best because the OEM is closer to the customer, has the best sense of what the market needs, and is more able to set the spec than the parts vendor. When you do it backward, the tail is wagging the dog, and the product is sub-optimal.

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