Is Google’s Giant Phablet Fit for Corporate Accounts?

Tablet sales are stagnant but phablet sales are up, so where does Google’s (GOOG) giant Nexus 6 smartphone, code-named Shamu after the famed Orca, fit with enterprise accounts? At this point, the phablet story in the enterprise still is unfolding but there are some clues.

With Apple (AAPL) intending to push its iPhone 6 and 6 Plus into business accounts, aided by its enterprise mobility deal with IBM (IBM), what will be Google’s strategy to get Shamu onto corporate desks? It might be simply to wait to see how phablets do in enterprise accounts. If enterprises take to the outsized smartphones, there may be a play there for channel partners.

According to researcher IDC, phablets aren’t only the wave of the future but also of the present. Shipments of so-called phablet smartphones, or mobile devices with screen sizes of 5.5 inches to 7 inches, will pass that of portable PCs in 2014 and top tablets in 2015, the researcher’s latest data shows. IDC expects manufacturers to ship 175 million phablets this year, more than the expected 170 million portable PCs. Next year, with 318 million units shipped, phablets will exceed by 36 percent the 233 million tablets forecast to ship.

Google unwrapped its gigundous 6-inch display Nexus 6 phablet running Android 5.0 Lollipop on Oct. 15, along with the Nexus 9 tablet and streaming media Nexus Player. Packaged in a contoured aluminum frame, it’s the largest Nexus mobile device Google’s ever offered. Shamu was co-developed with Motorola, whose $2.91 billion sale to Lenovo still is in the offing but is expected to close before the year is out.

Shamu is powered by a Qualcomm (QCOM) Snapdragon 805 quad-core chip running at 2.7GHz, and features Adreno 420 graphics and a choice of either 32GB or 64GB of internal storage. The device comes with a 13-megapixel rear-facing camera, a 2-megapixel front camera, dual front-facing speakers and a 3,220mAh battery Google said can last for 24 hours. Coming along with the phablet is Motorola’s Turbo Charger, which can supply six hours of battery use from a 15 minute charge.

Google will start taking pre-orders for the Nexus 6 beginning Oct. 29 and expects to have it in AT&T’s, Sprint’s T-Mobile’s U.S. Cellular’s and Verizon’s hands in November. There’s no word on how much Shamu will cost on a carrier contract but an unlocked, contract-free unit can be bought for about $649. By comparison, the iPhone 6 Plus starts at $749 without a contract in the United States.

The $399, 8.9-inch screen Nexus 9 tablet was built in collaboration with HTC and features a keyboard folio that magnetically attaches to the units, folds into two different angles and lays flat like a laptop. Google’s $99 Nexus Player is its first device running Android TV and is the product of a collaboration with Asus. The Nexus 9 and Nexus Player will be available for pre-order Oct. 17 and the Nexus 9 will be in stores Nov. 3.