In the span of just a month, both Samsung and Apple revitalized the line of tablets for the first time in three years. Nonetheless, this passive period of time experienced industry changes. The overall tablet sales didn’t manage to proliferate at all. Specialists are beginning to wonder if the public has any consideration left for this type of tech product.
Tablet Sales Decreased 20% Annually
In the fourth quarter, IDC consulted the numbers and drew out a declining situation for tablet sales. The number of shipments of such a product dropped 20% year over year. At the same time, Strategic Analytics registered double losses in this domain. In comparison, the introduction of the first tablets on the market sparked the remark that they would become greater than PCs. However, manufacturers are far from seeing the desired rate to which clients are updating their tablet collections.
Jitesh Ubrani is a senior analyst at IDC. According to him, consumers are still using their first generation of iPads.
“People have been hanging onto these devices, and they’re finding that they work just as well as they did when they were released.”
Manufacturers Need a Tablet Revolution to Revitalize the Market
There are few possible reasons that triggered the stagnation of a promising market. First of all, customers didn’t receive any incentive to refresh their tablet collections at the same rate as they do with their smartphones. Many users are employing their devices sporadically. This is why there is no wearing factor to urge them to replace them with the latest model.
Other experts are linking this negative phenomenon to the lack of innovation. While smartphones and laptops receive a booming warm up campaign prior to their release, consumers feel no eagerness for the launch of a new tablet. Furthermore, the technology that empowers tablets remained almost the same. By comparison, manufacturers strived to come up with the latest specs for their smartphones.
Another obstacle that tablets failed to overcome is the growing size of mobile gadgets. There are some tendencies on the market for smartphones to become slimmer and with larger displays. This trend turned them into a hybrid between a phone and a tablet. Thus, consumers don’t feel the need to carry a tablet with them when their smartphone can do so much more than other such gadgets.
However, not everything is lost with the tablet sales. There are still tens of millions of units being shipped to customers all over the world each quarter. However, companies need to create a massive evolution for tablets to surpass PCs in popularity.
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