Can Tablet PCs Move from the Consumer Market to the Boardroom? iPhones Did

Channel Insider content and product recommendations are editorially independent. We may make money when you click on links to our partners. Learn More.

Even sight unseen, tablet computers certainly seem to be the hot new form factor of 2010, as Apple prepares to release its market entry on Jan. 27, Acer tells a Bloomberg reporter that it is planning a tablet and several other companies have said they are also planning tablet computers.

Is it any wonder? The success of a mobile device like the iPhone and all its apps has just about everyone both in and outside of the smartphone space scrambling to come up with their own phones and their own apps and release them to an eager market.

And Amazon.com says its e-reader, Kindle, outranked every other product in sales during the holiday season, and electronic book sales outpaced the sales of other kinds of books at Christmastime.

Not to be outdone by moves of other vendors into the e-reader space it had staked out for itself (and to gain more competition in its effort to sell content — the primary reason it created the Kindle) — Amazon.com even announced plans to create its own developers’ program and apps store. This is clearly where the business is going in 2010.

With the surge of these e-readers and tablets hitting the market this year, the question is whether there is an opportunity for IT solution providers. Neither phones nor the Kindle are sold through resellers, but plenty of VARs consider smartphones to be the source of huge services opportunities as companies look to integrate them with existing IT infrastructure. Especially these days, as companies such as Salesforce.com are offering applications for the iPhone.

Could Kindle e-readers and other tablet devices from PC vendors also provide an integration opportunity at customer shops for IT solution providers? Can these devices go beyond being entertainment machines and make their way into the office? What do you think?