Helped by the Apple iPad, the worldwide PC market grew 7 percent during the first quarter, according to Canalys, which counts PC and tablet sales together.
Led
by the Apple iPad, worldwide PC shipments
increased 7 percent during the first quarter, according to research firm
Canalys, which includes tablets in its counts of PC
sales, rather than listing them separately.
PC
shipments during the quarter totaled 88.6 million units, up from 82.8 million a
year ago, while tablet shipments reach 6.4 million units worldwide.
"Apple
continued with its strategy to dominate the pad market," Canalys said in
an April 28 statement, "with the iPad or iPad 2 available in 59 markets by
the end of Q1."
Apple
accounted for 74 percent of the tablet market during the quarter, the report
added, despite iPad shipments being down 31 percent sequentially. Consumers held off from
buying the iPad after Apple announced in March that its iPad 2 would soon launch across additional markets.
On
April 27, Apple announced that the iPad 2-which is 33 percent
thinner and 15 percent lighter than its predecessor-would arrive
in Japan the following day, and in Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore and eight other countries on April 29. The full impact of
the iPad 2, according to Canalys, won't be known until future quarters.
Despite
Apple's dominance and uncontested success, Canalys nonetheless expects to see
a "significant change" in tablet market shares next quarter, as new
devices arrive from LG Electronics, Research In Motion, Acer and Asus. That should come as good news, as rising tablet
sales are said to come at the cost of PC manufacturers focused on consumer
netbooks and notebooks-particularly Acer and Asus.
"Overstocked
retail channels and unsteady consumer confidence in major European countries
and the United States cast a shadow over the potential for notebook market
growth during the remainder of 2011," stated the report. "Likewise,
the tsunami and earthquakes in Japan led to an 8% slowdown in the local PC
market there. The natural disasters also contributed to supply chain disruption
and uncertainty-highlighted in many IT vendors' quarterly
financial reports-the consequences of which will continue to be felt in
the second half of the year."
Still,
rising tablet sales are expected to boost overall PC figures through 2011.
"As
the iPad 2 and its competitors continue to roll out," Canalys analyst Tim Coulling
said in a statement, "we expect pad sales to propel PC market
growth for the rest of the year."
A
recent Canalys consumer survey additionally
shed light on the life of tablets beyond the sales counter, finding that, more
than as a media player or ebook reader, they're being used in ways that
resemble PCs. While tablet owners reported
using their tablets primarily for Web browsing, emailing and messaging, and
social networking, non-tablet owners suspected the devices were more heavily
used for ebook reading and video watching.
"The
pad represents a real threat to PC and consumer electronics vendors, as it is
capable of replacing devices in a range of other categories," said
Coulling.
The
Canalys report adds, however, that the ways tablets are used depend largely on
the devices' screen size, with data suggesting that users lean more toward video
watching than ebook reading on a 10-inch display than a 7-inch one.
"Vendors
should continue to promote content consumption as an important benefit of pads,
especially as ownership spreads to older consumers, while highlighting other
uses of the device and preloading advanced browsers and localized messaging and
social networking apps," said Canalys Chief Analyst Adam Daum. "Pad
app stores also need to offer a broader inventory of both apps and content
designed to take full advantage of a pad's size and functionality.'
Apple
CEO Steve Jobs has notoriously dismissed the relevance of 7-inch displays, and
the iPad features a 9.7-inch touch screen.
On
May 6, a WiFi-only iPad 2 will additionally be available in China. Further
international availability, said Apple, will be announced at a later date.
Michelle Maisto has been covering the enterprise mobility space for a decade, beginning with Knowledge Management, Field Force Automation and eCRM, and most recently as the editor-in-chief of Mobile Enterprise magazine. She earned an MFA in nonfiction writing from Columbia University, and in her spare time obsesses about food. Her first book, The Gastronomy of Marriage, if forthcoming from Random House in September 2009.
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