The tablet market seems to finally be evolving into an actual tablet market rather than a strictly iPad market with a bunch of wannabe also-rans. The current crop of , Toshiba, and Asus offer compelling features at a reasonable cost. However, the Cius is following in the footsteps of and won't be sticking around to join the fray.

You might be saying to yourself, "Cisco had a tablet?" If so, you're forgiven. Aside from the initial unveiling and hoopla when , it hasn't really been in the spotlight. That's because Cisco only offered it to enterprise customers through partner channels. You couldn't just pick one up at Best Buy.

Even if you could, the $750 price tag would probably convince you to just buy an iPad, or consider any of the many Android tablet alternatives that offer more features and performance for a fraction of the cost. As a tablet, the Cius is a relatively capable--yet unremarkable--7-inch Android device.

So, if the Cius isn't even offered through consumer retail channels, and wasn't positioned to compete with the Apple iPad, why did it ultimately lose to the iPad? BYOD.

A Cisco research study revealed that 95 percent of the organizations surveyed allow some form of BYOD (Bring Your Own Device), and that more than a third (36 percent) fully embrace the BYOD concept by providing full IT support for employee-owned devices. Basically, if nearly all companies allow users to bring their own iPad to work there's no longer a market for an over-priced enterprise-centric tablet.