Apple’s market share slips as tablets boom
APPLE will reveal its latest iPad lineup tonight, with new iPads and iPad Minis expected. But despite its fresh models the firm’s market share of the tablet space is slipping amid huge growth in the market.
The technology giant sold 14.6m iPads in its third quarter ending 29 June, a 14 per cent drop from the 17m it sold in the same quarter 2012.
And in its second quarter this year Apple’s tablet market share fell to 32 per cent from 60 per cent a year earlier, according to researcher IDC.
As the tablet market place has grown Apple’s market share has slipped. Worldwide tablet sales will explode this year, with shipments increasing by more than 40 per cent, while desktops and laptops are expected to fall 11 per cent.
Companies like Apple and Samsung are expected to ship 184.4m tablets as consumers increasingly turn to more mobile devices, according to a report yesterday from Gartner.
“Continuing on the trend we saw last year, we expect this holiday season to be all about smaller tablets as even the long-term holiday favourite — the smartphone — loses its appeal,” said Gartner research vice president Carolina Milanesi.