Gartner: Global Tablet PC Sales to Top 100 M. Units in 2014
2010/10/05 | By Steve ChuangTaipei, Oct. 5, 2010 (CENS)--With the success of Apple Inc.'s iPad effectively arousing global PC vendors' attention, the global market for tablet PCs will rapidly expand at an average compound annual growth rate of over 50% from 2010 to 2014, with total sales of the devices to exceed 100 million units in 2014, according to Gartner's principal analyst Christian Heidarson.
Heidarson noted that global sales of tablet PCs, including Apple's iPad, are estimated at 13.6 million units this year, and will shoot up to 30 million units in 2011. Also, he opines that tablet PCs with 10-inch touch screens will become the mainstream in the coming years, especially after Google will release its updated Android, one of the world's most popular operating systems for mobile devices, to support such models next year.
In addition, functional similarity to notebooks, along with increasingly friendly selling prices, will also help to boost popularity of 10-inch tablet PCs in the future. In 2013, Heidarsopn added, the selling price of an Android-installed tablet PC with a 10-inch touch screen will be lowered to only US$300, half the current price for a 7-inch model.
But, Gartner's report also indicates that market demand for 7-inch tablet PCs will significantly grow starting in 2013, partly because such models feature simple and convenient operation, and partly because telecom service companies have preferred to promote the models. Worth mentioning is that most vendors have focused their promotion on 7-inch models so far, which may lead to throat-cutting competitions in the segment in the future.
The institution also expects scale of the market will top US$9.7 billion in 2014, with the compound annual growth rate during 2010 to 2014 to exceed 50%, higher than those of any other electronic device segments.
Wintek's Sales Monthly Revenues in Q3, 2010 | ||
Month | Sales Revenue | Monthly Growth Rate |
July | NT$5.289 billion | 14% |
August | NT$6.149 billion | 16% |
September | NT$7.703 billion | 24% |
Source: Wintek