“Apple Inc. is expected to suffer its first decline in iPad shipments since the tablet’s launch in 2010, further evidence that the device is being squeezed by larger-screen phones,” Jennifer Booton reports for MarketWatch.
“Even with the traditionally strong holiday season still to report, it is expected to ship nearly 68 million tablets in 2014, according to market intelligence company ABI Research,” Booton reports. “While that’s still an impressive number, it would mark an 8.1% decline from the 74 million shipped a year ago.”
“While 2014 proved mostly a disappointment for tablet vendors, ABI Research predicts a better environment for shipments in 2015 as more businesses adopt tablets in the workplace. It forecasts a 16% year-over-year increase in shipments to 194 million units worldwide,” Booton reports. “It didn’t say whether it thinks Apple will benefit from the recovery. However Apple is strengthening its efforts in the enterprise segment, including partnering with IBM to build more than 100 apps over the next year aimed at the workplace.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: As we wrote of Tuesday:
iPad is a victim of its own spectacular early success. 250 million iPads have been sold to date. Tablets last longer than the two-year smartphone cycle. Therefore, the “slowdown” of iPad sales is natural.
Apple doesn’t play the “market share for market share’s sake” game. Apple’s share of quality tablet customers is and will remain exceedingly high, just the same as in personal computers, personal media players, and smartphones.
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