Another PC industry "this is going to save our butts" piece.
The only thing that is new here is the notion of a hybrid device that is not
optimized as either a laptop or a tablet. I've been using a Bluetooth keyboard
with my iPad for years, when appropriate.
The market for computing devices is exploding in many directions. There is no
single device that does everything. The marketplace is responding as it always
does with a range of devices and choices.
Only 212,000 million tablets in 2015?
The sky is falling!
Regards
Craig
On Oct 18, 2015, at 5:10 AM, Albert Manfredi <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
http://fortune.com/2015/10/17/2-in-1-hybrids/
Here's how hybrid laptops are going to save the tablet market
by Don Reisinger
October 17, 2015, 1:10 PM EDT
Hybrid laptops are giving the troubled tablet market a much-needed boost, say
analysts.
They’re not new, but 2-in-1 hybrids—which combine the features of a laptop
and tablet into a single device—are proving to be the only high point in an
otherwise troubled tablet market.
The tablet market’s struggles were made abundantly clear in August when
research firm IDC reported that it had revised its forecast down. The company
reported that worldwide tablet shipments in 2015 will decline by 8%
year-over-year, worse than the research firm’s previous forecast of a 3.8%
drop. IDC, which includes 2-in-1 hybrids in its forecast, said that it
anticipates 212 million tablets will be shipped in 2015.
If not for hybrids, things could have been even worse for tablets this year.
IDC said that the 2-in-1 segment will see shipments worldwide jump 86.5% in
2015. IDC attributed the category’s success to its ability to “appeal to an
audience seeking an alternative to pure tablets with smaller screens.”
The success of 2-in-1 hybrids has prompted a slew of manufacturers to enter
the market with new devices. IDC program director Ryan Reith said in a
statement in August that in the second quarter, alone, 40 vendors around the
world shipped a 2-in-1 device. Just two years ago, that figure stood at 14
vendors. What’s more, there’s no sign of that trend slowing down anytime soon.
Dell last week announced the new XPS 12—a 2-in-1 tablet that comes with a
12-inch screen and a full-sized keyboard. The company’s device followed
Microsoft’s MSFT 1.00% announcement earlier this month about the Surface
Book, a Windows 10-based device that takes cues from both laptops and
tablets. The Lenovo Yoga, Asus Transformer, and countless other products also
dot the 2-in-1 market, hoping to succeed where tablets have been failing.
“[The] 2-in-1s are the only reason we expect the overall tablet market to
experience positive growth from 2016 onward,” Jitesh Ubrani, senior research
analyst at IDC says. “Pure slate tablets will continue to decline as 2-in-1s
become more affordable and as Windows 10 gains traction.”
Ranjit Atwal, research director at Gartner, also believes that Windows 10
will be an important driver for 2-in-1s, saying that it will be a “catalyst
for change” in consumer buying behavior. He adds that solid state
drives—which provide more reliable storage than their hard disk drive
counterparts—along with Intel’s new processors will help spur growth in
hybrids in the coming years.
“Collectively they will enable vendors to create premium-experience tablets
and hybrids that can replace a notebook with minimum or no compromises,” he
says.
Not even the mighty Apple AAPL -0.78% has been able to overcome the hybrid
onslaught. The company’s tablet business has slipped in the last year as
shipments and revenue have seen a steep decline. During Apple’s last-reported
quarter, for instance, the company reported that iPad sales revenue hit $4.5
billion, down 23% compared to the prior year and unit sales were off 18%
year-over-year.
Those troubles, along with the broader market competition, have not gone
unnoticed by Apple or analysts. Over the last year, Apple CEO Tim Cook was
forced to fend off claims that its iPad business was in free fall, saying in
an earnings call in July that he’s “still bullish on [the] iPad.”
“I think and I believe that the iPad consumer upgrade cycle will eventually
occur,” he said at the time. “It’s not like people have forgotten iPad or
anything. It’s a fantastic product. So I see a lot of runway.”
Cook followed up those statements with a press event in September when Apple
announced an update to the iPad Mini and a new, large-screen tablet called
the iPad Pro. While the latter product hasn’t launched yet, analysts don’t
believe it’ll have meaningful impact on the market and turn things around.
Indeed, IDC has not revised its 2015 forecast and still believes that the
tablet market’s shipments will continue to decline, despite the product’s
announcement.
“If [vendors] can get the pricing down, it opens the market to a much larger
audience and we could see the reverse of the tablet/PC substitution
phenomenon and (see consumers) move from basic tablets back to PCs of
different types,” says Atwal.
Tablets, once the devices that caused consumers to buy fewer computers, are
no longer as popular as they once were. Along the way, hybrids, which for a
long time were ignored by a large segment of the market, now have new life.
More importantly, if things keep up as analysts expect there’s only one place
for hybrids to go: up.
“At last, the PC market will have devices that the user actually needs and
maybe even wants,” Atwal says.
