Do tablets have a future in business?

• Position: MOBILE DEVICES - Brief article

BlackBerry CEO Thorstein Heins predicts that tablets will not prove to be an effective business tool.

"In five years I don't think there'll be a reason to have a tablet anymore; maybe a big screen in your workspace, but not a tablet as such. Tablets themselves are not a good business model," Heins said in a recent interview reported by Engage.com.

Some attribute Heins' somewhat controversial remarks to Blackberry's less-than-stellar experience with PlayBook, its version of a tablet. The growth in the use of tablets in the consumer market has clearly seeped into the business market, a trend that some experts believe will continue with the changing demographics of the workforce.

Gartner Inc. predicts that business purchases of tablets will more than triple from 13 million units sold in 2012 to 43 million by 2016. If Gartner is correct, this would, of...