HP Slate Headed For Enterprise Customers, Not Mass Market

Well, there you have it. We've been riding the HP Slate roller-coaster for quite some time now, with our fingernails firmly clamped in our teeth. Waiting on the edge our seat since the acquisition of Palm to see if the Slate, running its infamous Windows 7, would ever see the light of day. And sure enough, today we finally have an answer. It's definitely coming, but there's one big change: enterprise.

HP's Personal Systems Group Vice President, Todd Bradley, was speaking amongst his colleagues today at Fortune Brainstorm, and he managed to inform everyone listened, and anyone else who couldn't but still cares, that the HP Slate as we know it is no longer a consumer product, but instead intended solely for the enterprise market.

When's it coming? Well, that's in the Fall, as they say. So, any time now, basically, but before the holiday shopping season (not that that matters anymore, mind you). And while we've got ourself an answer about this, now we're left wondering what this means. Windows staying with the enterprise for HP, and then they'll focus on webOS for the mainstream consumer? Who knows, but it seems promising.