Santa Clara, Calif. – The
mobile computing space will see a slight drop in shipments in 2011 as the
market shifts away from netbooks and learns how to absorb the new tablet PCs
coming online.
However, the category
will continue to enjoy double-digit growth, said DisplaySearch.
The research firm is
forecasting a 3 percent decline in growth down to 27 percent for 2011 on
shipments of 227.7 million units worldwide.
Richard Shim,
DisplaySearch’s mobile computing analyst, said this decrease can be attributed
to a declining netbook market and slow growth in emerging markets.
DisplaySearch expects
netbook shipments to fall 20 percent year over year to about 25.4 million units
this year. In addition, in the future these devices will find most of their
sales success in price sensitive regions such as emerging nations and the
education market.
Oddly, adding to the
categories minor slump is the very hot tablet PC, Shim said. He pointed to the
need for retailers and vendors to figure out how best to sell their initial
offerings in the face of tough competition from the well-entrenched iPad. He
expects his to lead to a small decline in shipments during the first half of
2011.
Tablet PC growth should
hit 52.4, DisplaySearch reported, with most sales going into mature markets.
This will give tablets a 150 percent increase over 2010.
Finally, laptop growth will continue to drive the mobile
computing category. DisplaySearch’s forecast has laptops with a 20 percent
shipment increase in 2011.
