“On the eve of the Apple Event scheduled for tomorrow morning, Gartner rains down and states that the tablet trend is on a steep decline as growth has gone from 55% in 2013 to a measly 11% in 2014,” Jack Purcher reports for Patently Apple. “While Apple’s iPad sales have been down for the last two quarters, the tide could begin to turn as early as tomorrow if Apple could deliver something that brings back that original iPad magic.”
“Gartner’s report states that ‘tablet sales growth is slowing in 2014 as new hardware buyers turn to alternative devices and existing users extend the lifetime of their tablets. Gartner, Inc. estimates that tablet sales worldwide will reach 229 million units in 2014, an 11 percent increase from 2013, representing 9.5 percent of total worldwide sales of devices in 2014. In 2013, tablet sales grew 55 percent,'” Purcher reports. “It’s a troubling trend.”
“Apple’s CEO Tim Cook has viewed the drop in tablet sales as just a breather in the market or a bump in the road as he pounding the table last quarter that there was significant innovation on the way,” Purcher writes. “I don’t know if Cook was referring to the iPad Plus or iPad Pro (however they brand it) that’s on the drawing board for early 2015 or something refreshing that we might expect to see roll out tomorrow.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Yeah, uh, about Gartner’s prognosticative abilities*:
Gartner: Microsoft Windows Phone market share to surpass Apple’s iOS in 2015 – April 7, 2011
*or lack thereof
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Lynn Weiler” for the heads up.]