BBO Tablet?

[JFrizz]

Why wouldn't BBO develop an BBO only Android Tablet? Sell the for $50 or give them away free to all BBO Prime members with a 3 year committment?

[hrothgar]

At the most basic level, because BBO is is a small software developer and probably has zero experience in manufacturing or outsourcing embedded hardware.

 

Coupled with this, what value added does BBO provide? Why is it better for BBO to develop a dedicated piece of hardware rather than allowing end users to purchase commodity COTS hardware and run BBO on the browser that comes with the device?

 

Who is providing tech support for the device?

 

Are there economies of scale here? How many people would want to get such a device? Is this enough to justify all sorts of annoyances around setting up a supply chain, distribution, what have you?

[pescetom]

This might be the secret plan which explains why I still can't use 'split screen' on my own Android tablet (10 inch with full HD) B-)

[JFrizz]

Isn't BBO owned by 52 Entertainment?

 

https://www.52-entertainment.com/

 

"INDUSTRY LEADER"

We are the world leader in bridge.

People from 180 countries are playing more than a billion games per year on our platforms.

 

[mycroft]

It's hard to find numbers, but Magic Arena - note, not the only way to play M:tG online, not even the only way to play it sanctioned by Wizards of the Coast - had 2.8 billion games played in Q3 2020. And note that they expect you to play 3 games in an hour. Now, granted, only two players, but still.

 

And they have zero interest in a bespoke device. (Actually, I'm sure they have a lot of interest in a bespoke device - they've figured out how to get their players to pay for the same card, sometimes four copies of it, three times already. Another chance? If it thought it would make money, they'd be on it like a dirty shirt. Hmm.)

 

World of Tanks currently has 180 000 active players/day. Don't know how many games that is, but that's 4 times the count of players that break BBO currently.

 

I'm guessing the big poker sites are running a billion hands a day (granted, at 75 hands/hour, it adds up fast). And that's for Real Money. And yet, no bespoke devices.

 

52 Entertainment may be the big fish in a small pond, but Bridge, seriously, is a small pond.

[pilowsky]

Elsewhere on the 52 Entertainment site it is stated that:

Our offering is currently centered around the most played mind game in the world : Bridge

There is a very slight possibility that this claim is a mild exaggeration.

They also own Funbridge but probably have nothing to do with the Australian club Funbridge Australia - membership = 1.

[pescetom]

I'm guessing the big poker sites are running a billion hands a day (granted, at 75 hands/hour, it adds up fast). And that's for Real Money. And yet, no bespoke devices.

 

Not only is it dubious to complicate a clear business model with hard to manage deviations, but selling physical devices has all sorts of national and continental legal and fiscal implications that are the last thing most multinational software services want to deal with, especially if they are small enough to finish below the radar otherwise.