Samsung Tablets Eating Up Apple’s Market Share
Following on from the news that Samsung shipped 2.6x the number of smartphones that Apple did last quarter, new figures released by research firm IDC show that Samsung tablet shipments grew by 123% to 9.7 million tablets over the same period. While Apple still leads the way with 29.6% of the tablet market, this is down considerably from the 40.2% share the company captured during this same quarter last year. Samsung meanwhile holds a company record 20.4% of the market, while Asus holds 7.4% (representing a 53% year on year increase). The two biggest growth companies for tablets are Acer and Lenovo — with their shipments increasing 346% and 420% respectively to represent 0.9% and 1.1% of the overall market.
In all, this signals a growing dominance of Android tablet sales, although Apple’s market share will likely increase coming off the launch of the iPad Air and iPad Mini with Retina display, both of which received excellent reviews.
“With two 7.9in models starting at $299 and $399, and two 9.7in models starting at $399 and $499, Apple is taking steps to appeal to multiple segments,” said Jitesh Ubrani, research analyst with IDC’s Tablet Tracker. “While some undoubtedly hoped for more aggressive pricing from Apple, the current prices clearly reflect Apple’s ongoing strategy to maintain its premium status.”
“It’s worth noting that Apple wasn’t the only one to increase the price of its small sized tablet during this product cycle: Both Google and Amazon increased the price of their newest 7in tablets from $199 to $229 to cover the higher costs associated with high resolution screens and better processors.”
“White box tablet shipments continue to constitute a fairly large percentage of the Android devices shipped into the market,” noted Tom Mainelli, research director of tablets at IDC. “These low cost Android-based products make tablets available to a wider market of consumers, which is good.”
Overall, worldwide tablet shipments grew to 47.6 million units in the third quarter of 2013: a 7% over the previous financial quarter, and a 36.7% leap from this time last year.
