That control will cost a company far more than the $750 street price for the tablet, Cisco officials acknowledged without offering precise numbers. Cius will run on a company's IP-PBX communications infrastructure that requires a secure wired LAN and secure Wi-Fi along with a PBX switch. The latest version of Cisco's communication manager software, version 8.5, will be required as well. Even a docking station with a traditional telephone desk handset will cost $400 each, said Chuck Fontana, director of product management for Cisco Cius.

Cisco also said it will offer "basic" access to AppHQ management capabilities within the price of each Cius device, but then will charge an extra amount, undetermined, for higher level functions.

Ken Dulaney, an analyst for Gartner, said the Cius tablet is "unique" among tablets because of all the Cisco-related communications functions. "You have to have the [communications management] system from the Cisco PBX group to manage the Cius," he noted, adding that many potential Cius customers already have such software in place.

The BlackBerry PlayBook tablet has been focused on business users more than any other tablet on the market so far, but Cisco executives said Cius will out-do Playbook because Cius will support videoconference calls over wired networks and Wi-Fi as well as enterprise-class phone calling. That means the Cius can easily connect to Webex collaboration and other functions.

"Cius is targeted as an extension of Cisco's unified communications capabilities and will appeal to certain classes of companies where compatibility and Cisco support for Voice over IP, videoconferencing and access to unified communications functions is important," said Jack Gold, an analyst at J. Gold Associates. "Cisco is targeting its heartland users with this device. If we look at Cius from that perspective and not as a mass market competitor to the , then Cisco can sell relatively few of these by iPad standards and still be quite successful."