IDC sees tablet shipments eclipsing notebooks this year, all PCs in 2015

Posted:
in iPad edited January 2014
Led by devices with screens smaller than 8 inches, tablets are expected to surpass notebook PC shipments this year to become the predominant non-smartphone mobile computing platform.

The latest projections, published on Tuesday by IDC, call for tablet shipments to reach 229.3 million units this year, up from 144.5 million a year ago. That will likely be enough to push tablets ahead of notebook computers.

iPad


And by 2015, IDC predicts that tablets will out-ship all PC units, including desktops. The prediction comes as tablet sales continue to rise, and the PC market remains in a slump.

Those struggles were predicted by late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs in 2010, when he said the debut of the iPad signaled the beginning of a market-wide transition to a post-PC era. At the time Jobs believed that traditional PCs would remain, but their presence would be diminished over time as fewer users would need their specific abilities.

"The transformation of the PC to new form factors like the tablet is going to make some people uneasy because the PC has taken us a long ways," Jobs said at the AllThingsD conference. "The PC is brilliant? and we like to talk about the post-PC era, but it's uncomfortable."

To date, Apple's iPad has been the dominant device in the tablet market. But current growth is being driven largely by low-cost Android devices, IDC said.

The firm believes that the average selling price for tablets will drop 10.8 percent to $381 this year. That's still above the $329 entry price of the iPad mini, but well below the $499 starting price of the full-size iPad.

"Apple's success in the education market has proven that tablets can be used as more than just a content consumption or gaming device," said Jitesh Ubrani, research analyst for IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Tablet Tracker. "These devices are learning companions, and as tablet prices continue to drop, the dream of having a PC for every child gets replaced with the reality that we can actually provide a tablet for every child."

Reflecting Apple's success with the iPad mini, and the popularity of low-cost Android tablets, IDC believes that tablets with screen sizes of 8 inches or less will account for 55 percent of shipments this year. That's expected to increase to 57 percent by 2017.

And while tablets sized between 8 and 11 inches were 73 percent of the market in 2011 before the introduction of the iPad mini, that market segment is expected to shrink to 37 percent by 2017.

IDC's market-wide forecast comes on the heels of a projection by noted analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities, who said last week that he believes iPad shipments could see their first-ever year-over-year decline in the second quarter of calendar 2013. To date, Apple has managed to grow iPad shipments every quarter since the launch of the first model in 2010.

But Apple has signaled that it is not planning to introduce any major new products ??namely updated iPads or iPhones ??until this fall. As consumers wait for new devices, some, such as Kuo, expect that shipments will fall.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 14
    iPad at home, iMac at work.
  • Reply 2 of 14
    solipsismxsolipsismx Posts: 19,566member
    I could see tablets eclipsing all PCs sooner than 2015.

    iPad at home, iMac at work.
    Lady on the street, freak in the sheets. (Wait, what are we doing?)
  • Reply 3 of 14
    anantksundaramanantksundaram Posts: 20,403member


    Yeah. IDC said so, therefore it must be true. (NOT).

  • Reply 4 of 14
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member


    Originally Posted by anantksundaram View Post

    Yeah. IDC said so, therefore it must be true. (NOT).


     


    IDC: I Don't Care.

  • Reply 5 of 14
    solipsismxsolipsismx Posts: 19,566member
    IDC: I Don't Care.

    Integers Don't Calculate?
  • Reply 6 of 14
    mstonemstone Posts: 11,510member


    This is good news. I hate cheap PCs. So, high end workstations and servers will be the only viable market segments for traditional computing platforms going forward? Ironically the two categories Apple has abandoned. We'll see how the new Mac Pros fit in when/if they arrive. I have a bad feeling though, will it be FCPX all over again with a dumbed down pro-sumer focus?

  • Reply 7 of 14
    umrk_labumrk_lab Posts: 550member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by mstone View Post


    This is good news. I hate cheap PCs. So, high end workstations and servers will be the only viable market segments for traditional computing platforms going forward? Ironically the two categories Apple has abandoned. We'll see how the new Mac Pros fit in when/if they arrive. I have a bad feeling though, will it be FCPX all over again with a dumbed down pro-sumer focus?



     


     


    With BYOD policy, I guess, that, on the contrary, that iPads will disseminate within companies .... 

  • Reply 8 of 14
    herbapouherbapou Posts: 2,228member


    I am hoping Apple keeps the current ipad mini when the new one gets out, but drop the price so it can maintain a decent market share.

  • Reply 9 of 14
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member


    Originally Posted by herbapou View Post

    I am hoping Apple keeps the current ipad mini when the new one gets out, but drop the price so it can maintain a decent market share.


     


    Is the current price not "maintaining a decent marketshare"? image

  • Reply 10 of 14
    jungmarkjungmark Posts: 6,926member
    herbapou wrote: »
    I am hoping Apple keeps the current ipad mini when the new one gets out, but drop the price so it can maintain a decent market share.

    The market share game is not what Apple is playing.

    Didn't IDC predict net books would out ship traditional PCs by 2015 in the pre iPad days?
  • Reply 11 of 14


    While market-share is not a metric Apple chases, there is a minimum share that needs to be maintained since zero market-share equals zero profit.


     


    Apple can command a higher than average price for iPads if the experience of an iPad exceeds that on a vanilla tablet by enough of a margin. I cannot imagine what Apple could add to the iDevice ecosystem to inflate the experience any further, but I feel that is where Apple is focused. There may be some lowering of prices and some raising of hardware specs, but it's in leveraging the ecosystem that Apple can maintain it's high profits and hold market-share. 


     


    Apple's ecosystem is fed by a very high installed-base and it will take some time before any other one device can challenge Apple on this metric. In addition, since all of Apple's iDevices can sync and use most of the same apps, Apple's lead in effective installed-base is even greater than the sum of its parts.

  • Reply 12 of 14


    In June 2011 IDC predicted 2012 tablet sales of 80 million so they were off 80% over the next 7 to 19 months.  Accuracy is not apparently their strong suit.

  • Reply 13 of 14
    herbapouherbapou Posts: 2,228member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post


     


    Is the current price not "maintaining a decent marketshare"? image



     


    I assumed the current price will be used by the new ipad mini.  The old model at a lower price point would address the low end market.

  • Reply 14 of 14
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member


    Originally Posted by herbapou View Post

    The old model at a lower price point would address the low end market.


     


    Oh, come on.

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