Skip to main content

Cloud Service Adoption Transforms Personal Computing

Global consumer electronics vendors experienced a challenging environment in 2016, due to the shift in product preferences of savvy buyers. With the exception of Chromebooks, the personal computing category has not had the market demand or device shipments that could sustain the vendors.

Case in point; consumer spending during the holiday quarter of 2016 was clearly not aimed at consuming media tablets, as the market continued its downturn. The fourth quarter of 2016 (4Q16) marked the ninth consecutive quarter that tablet shipments have declined.

Media Tablet Market Development

Vendors shipped 52.9 million tablets in the fourth quarter, which was a decline of 20.1 percent from the same quarter one year ago, according to the latest worldwide market study by International Data Corporation (IDC) .

Similarly, shipments of 174.8 million units for the full year 2016 were down 15.6 percent compared to 2015 -- marking the second straight year of declining shipments of media tablets.

"The sentiment around the tablet market continues to grow stale despite a lot of talk about vendors pivoting their product portfolios toward the detachable segment," said Ryan Reith, program vice president at IDC.


Typical tablets without a dedicated keyboard -- which IDC refers to as slate tablets -- are continuing to lose relevancy across all regions, and as a result the market decline is a truly  global phenomena.

Vendors that have historically led the notebook PC market are also talking about expanding their product portfolios to include more detachable tablets. IDC believes the second half of 2017 will bring a wide range of new detachable devices from the notebook PC OEMs as well as those playing primarily in the smartphone space.

Yet even detachable tablets struggled to maintain momentum in the fourth quarter as flagship products from key players like Microsoft and Apple started to show signs of age.

Outlook for Tablet Market Growth

"The market continues to warm up to two-in-one devices, but we're now getting to a point where the price and performance disparity between detachables and convertibles has started to narrow, and this added competition led to a dampening in the growth of detachable tablets," said Jitesh Ubrani, senior research analyst with IDC.

However, the analyst firm expects this to be temporary, as only two of the three major platforms have any significant hardware presence in the detachable market, and as the ecosystems are further refined with future updates and developer support.

That said, expect to see more new Chromebook models introduced in 2017, as the personal computing market continues the trend towards 'good enough' lower-cost portable devices that enable secure access to a multitude of consumer and enterprise cloud-based services. The ongoing market transformation seems inevitable.

Popular posts from this blog

Virtual Reality Market Set to Reach $100 Billion

Virtual Reality (VR) market growth is now finally coming to fruition. Thanks to current actions and market momentum, VR is approaching what can be considered critical mass. And, not a moment too soon. This growth momentum comes from new hardware and content releases, accelerating enterprise value recognition, and a significant metaverse wild card that could potentially lift adoption and usage. According to the latest worldwide market study by ABI Research, over 85 million VR Head Mounted Displays (HMDs) will be shipped in 2027 across consumer and enterprise segments, creating a $100 billion VR market that includes hardware, software, and services. Virtual Reality Market Development "Expectations have been high in VR for years, and even decades, without notable growth to show. That growth is finally coming over the next five years," said Eric Abbruzzese, research director at ABI Research . The barrier to entry is lower than ever, all while content performance and user experien

Human Resource Transformation Enabled by IT

Many senior executives are taking a proactive approach to digital business transformation in order to achieve their strategic goals. Delivering revenue growth and profitability is now imperative for every function, including Human Resources (HR). The top 3 priority HR technologies this year are skills management, learning experience platforms, and internal talent marketplaces, according to the latest worldwide market study by Gartner. "With a tumultuous global economy, HR technology leaders face a balancing act in 2023," said Sam Grinter, director at Gartner . "Leaders must anticipate greater levels of accountability and demand for measurable outcomes to justify new technology investments." HR Transformation Market Development Forty-four percent of HR leaders report driving better business outcomes is their number one strategic priority for HR technology transformation over the next three years. Growth in headcount and skills (26 percent) and cost optimization (17 p

How Savvy Pioneers Lead the Future of Work

Hybrid and fully remote work are inevitable in the Global Networked Economy where high-performance talent demands flexibility from employers. To enable these progressive work models, organizations are investing in a wide range of technologies to support more agile types of employment.  According to the latest worldwide market study by International Data Corporation (IDC), leading organizations will spend nearly $1 billion on the Future of Work (FoW) in 2023 -- that's an increase of 18.8 percent over 2022. Future of Work Market Development "Work models continue to evolve, but 37 percent of decision-makers in a recent global survey note that Remote and Hybrid work models will be an embedded part of accepted work practices, supported by a continued shift to the cloud, increasingly instrumented and interconnected physical workplaces, and intelligent digital workspaces," said Holly Muscolino, group vice president at IDC . According to the IDC assessment, organizations must mak