I think part of the problem is that the Fourth floor is looking at the EFB in aircraft terms - they look at an upgrade for the airplane as a 10-20 year investment, they also want for it to pay for itself in a year or 18 months.
The problem with tech is that 2 years is an eternity, especially with tablets. I mean, 4 years ago there was zero market for them. Now, Apple is shipping millions a year.
I flew with an LCA last year who said, "oh, we're getting them".. I said I didn't think so - it doesn't "do" anything that our paper manuals don't do. Essentially it's a $5 million dollar purchase that doesn't do (as far as I can tell) anything that we aren't doing right now. Yes, they don't have to pay Jepp to do revisions, but I bet Jepp prices the cost of the software right around the same price, maybe even higher.
As for Windows RT, if you look at market share, Windows RT is just a small sliver when compared to iOS and Android. It's not in anyone's economic interest to develop software for Windows RT when it's such a small percentage of the market (when the cost of developing for RT is probably the same or even higher).
I understand why management picked the Windows RT device, when they look at pure numbers - but the success of the iPad ensures that it (or some form of it) will be around in 5 years, where the Windows device might not make it to 2015.
So then in a year (when it's finally rolled out) we have a device that possibly isn't even built and no one supports. Excellent.
