Is BlackBerry Chief Executive Officer Thorsten Heins being prophetic or simply sourgraping? That question will definitely be on the mind of techies and geeks alike after Mr Heins forecast the tablet will be dead in 2018.

"In five years I don't think there'll be a reason to have a tablet anymore. Maybe a big screen in your workplace, but not a tablet as such," Bloomberg quoted the BlackBerry official at the Milken Institute Conference in Los Angeles.

He insisted that tablets are not good business models and within the same five-year period, BlackBerry would "be the absolute leader in mobile computing," selling tens of millions of handsets.

However, BlackBerry's biggest customer - the Pentagon - has already opened the door to other operating systems such as the iOS of Apple and Google's Android despite the tight security system of the BlackBerry OS that the U.S. Defence Department appreciates.

Mr Heins debunked rumours that BlackBerry would roll in May at the company's Live conference out a new tablet after it unsuccessful bid to market the PlayBook.

While his forecast could easily be dismissed as sourgraping, however, the declining iPad profits could be one indicator that his prediction may have a grain of truth in it given that market leaders once thought as invincible - beginning with Motorola, followed by Nokia, BlackBerry and Apple - all fell down from their top post and find it difficult to regain their lost glory.

The BlackBerry Live expo will run from May 13 to 17.

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