Apple’s next big thing? A $500 iSlate with a long-lasting battery, analysts say (Apple, iTablet, iPhone, tech, news, report, review

Forget about e-books, OLED display, and movies – the top features of Apple’s rumored tablet will be the price and battery life. If the iSlate is really Apple’s next big thing, it shouldn’t cost more than $500 or force us into another monthly data plan – and it absolutely must run at least six hours on a single charge (solar charging would be a plus).

As you know, Apple’s rumored tablet could debut at a media event next Wednesday, 10am Pacific time, at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francis

co. As the day draws closer, analysts are running spreadsheets and polling would-be consumers in order to figure out what people want from an alleged 10-inch multitouch gizmo and determine a possible impact of this thing on Apple’s fortunes. Make no mistake about it – the iSlate has a chance to emerge as Apple’s next big thing provided the company plays its cards right. If not, the gadget could easily file as a dud and die a slow death as a niche offering, like so many tablets before it. Analysts see a huge window of opportunity for the rumored device.

According to RBC Capital Markets’ analyst Mike Abramsky, the iSlate is likely to become a nearly $3 billion business. His assumption is based on a $600 price point, an estimated sales of five million units throughout 2010 and a 30 percent gross margin – all totalling to a $2.8 billion of additional revenue. The figure includes an estimated three percent Mac and iPod touch

cannibalization and would represent a six percent increase in Apple’s total revenue, adding 30 cents EPS to Apple’s stock, Abramsky explained in a note to clients Friday. He also wrote that “anticipation for an Apple Tablet resembles that of Moses bringing down the 10 Commandments.”

Such a level of pre-launch demand, ChangeWave noted, is similar to August 2005 when the same percentage of respondents said they would buy the then-new Intel Macs.

An Apple tablet has a potential to alter the dynamics of the PC market and related markets (e.g., e-reader/ e-book market). But the real impact won’t be fully determined until consumers get to see it, feel it, test it and decide if the ‘iSlate’ is all it’s chalked up to be.

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