Tablet shipments register negative growth for second quarter in a row
Some said that tablets are going to kill the PCs but now it looks like tablet market isin as much trouble as the PC market is. According to IDC, the world wide tablet shipments declined for second quarter in a row (Year over Year shipment comparison). This time, with 47.1 million shipments, the decline was at 5.9%. As expected, apple kept the lead at the top but Samsung is slowly inching close though both registered a decline. Lenovo has pushed ASUS to fourth place while LG entered the table for the first time, thanks to massive spike in shipments. The world is moving towards 2-in-1 and we guess Microsoft is definitely in a better position compared to Apple and Google, thanks to highly flexible Windows 10 and unified application design guidelines.
“The market slowdown that we witnessed last quarter is continuing to impact the tablet segment, but we see some growth areas that are starting to materialize,” said Jean Philippe Bouchard, Research Director, Tablets. “Cellular-enabled tablets are outgrowing the rest of the market, providing an additional revenue stream for OEMs and mobile operators. In addition to driving higher usage than Wi-Fi-only tablets, cellular-enabled tablets also help position the segment as true mobile solutions rather than stay-at-home devices.”
Though apple still lead the tablet market, it is now more likely than ever to lose the grip on tablet market. In terms of OS market share Android already leads iOS by a massive margin. Apple sole 12.6 million units, down from 16.4 million units sold in 1Q2014. As a result, the market share fell from 32.7% to 26.8%. Samsung also registered negative growth and market share fell from 21.6% to 19.1%. Lenovo improved their market share but only by half a percentage as they could only improve the shipment to 2.5 million from 2 million. ASUS was the worst of all as they could only ship 1.8 million units last quarter and if this continues, LG may take the #4 spot from ASUS in this quarter.
The interesting part to consider here is how strong the generic manufacturers are here. The top five tablet makers could account for under 60% of shipments, down from ~65% last year. As it turned out, tablet buyers are not as loyal to the big brands as they are for Smartphones and other electronic products. Tablet is a expendable product and is not a ‘cannot live without’ gadget and this is making many go for which ever tablet provides best bang for the buck and this is why smaller tablet OEMs are making a big dent.
“Although the tablet market is in decline, 2-in-1’s are certainly a bright spot,” said Jitesh Ubrani, Senior Research Analyst, Worldwide Quarterly Tablet Tracker. “While 2-in-1, or detachables, still account for a small portion of the overall market, growth in this space has been stunning as vendors like Asus, Acer, and E-FUN have been able to offer products at a fantastic value; and vendors like Microsoft have been able to drive growth at the high end with devices like the Surface Pro 3.”
