There are plenty of supposed Steam Deck killers available in the portable gaming space, from the Asus ROG Ally to the Lenovo Legion Go and all the Ayaneo and ONEXPLAYER devices in between. But none of them have managed to outright slay the dragon that is the mighty Steam Deck yet.
From some of the interviews with Gabe before its release, I’m pretty sure the sole point of the Steam Deck is to bring in new customers. He talked about how painful the price point was, and I think they actually are selling each one at a loss.