Western Europe will tie with North America as the largest Ultrabook market in 2016 with sales of around 90 million in total, says a report by Juniper Research, UK. Global annual sales are predicted to be 178 million for 2016. Sales will take-off in 2014.
Full details are only available to those paying a hefty sum for the full report but Juniper give us a few things to think about in a video, a white paper, a press release and a list of contents…
Following our report that ASUS will be updating the UX Zenbook series and are tentatively planning a launch in May we now have an official statement that new ASUS Ultrabooks will indeed come in May. Prices will be attractive too.
At an investor conference Executive Officer Jerry Shen said there would be ‘a number’ of new models to cover each price segment with price possible starting at US$699
The last week has been pretty poor in terms of Ultrabook news. There’s been some discussion about sales numbers and prices (again!), some discussion about the MacBook Air (again) and some discussion about the Transformer Prime as it relates to Ultrabooks (e.g. here and here. Update: Similar here.) I saw a major online PC magazine pump out a raft of generic Ultrabook articles for Google to trawl and to top it off, Lenovo said they couldn’t send us a U300s for testing. Thank goodness Daniel sent us his U300s owner review!
Yesterday’s top Ultrabook theme was the Intel ‘Pop-Up Theater’ Ultrabook video which I thought was cute, but a little weak. Done in the ‘flashmob’ style it felt a like a poor attempt at a viral campaign that copies too much from other set-ups we’ve seen before. It was obviously heavily edited and didn’t really tell anyone about what the Ultrabook was. The Popup Theatre website has 233 tweets and 469 Facebook likes as I write which will grow over time but seems middle-of-the-road; echoing the production.
Intel says 40%, Merril Lynch say 7%.
These two figures represent the highest and lowest numbers I’ve seen so far for 2012 Ultrabook sales. 40% was always a tough number to swallow but 7%, that’s 15m sales, sounds a bit low. Netbooks are predicted to sell 20m this year and with prices on new Ultrabooks targeting $699 in Q3, you could see quite the rush on Q4 sales.
“Ultrabook pricing will need to be lowered to about US$750 to gain broader acceptance, and vendors may be able to move closer to the target in 2012 by finding cost savings in the unit’s CPU, storage and casing, the bank said. ”
Reports yesterday showed that Acer, usually one of the price-beaters, was ready to focus on the $699-$799 market in Q3 this year.
Merril Lynch also estimates 50m sales in 2013.
In a previous report (Sept 2011 that is available here as a PDF) Merril Lynch said that a $600 price point would cover 50% of the price-band that laptops cover. That’s a 120 million unit ‘addressable market’ opportunity in 2013.
Not that we mind really. As long as there are good-value, good quality choices in the thin,light and productive laptop category we’re happy!
Ultrabooks forecast to make up 20% of notebook sales in 2013 – CNA ENGLISH NEWS.
No source is quoted, or has been found for this article.
If you want a laugh at a spin on some good news this morning, read the story that Apples share of the Ultrabook market will fall. When you own nearly 100% of the market and you get your first competitors, the only way to go is down. the good news is that sales numbers, the important figures, will rise.
It’s estimated the the MacBook Air now accounts for 28% of all MacBook sales in the US market. Looking at the MBA as a sealed-unit, thin-and-light in a range of traditional notebook solutions, it’s interesting to draw comparisons to the Ultrabook in its larger notebook market.
Specifications and links for the MacBook Air are in the database.
It’s taken the MBA 3 years to reach this penetration, the same could happen in the Windows notebook category and in a shorter timeframe because I believe much of the reason for the accelerated penetration seen by the MBA is because the platform, as used in all Ultrabooks, now meets or exceeds most customer expectations. In previous generations it didn’t.
I’m not going to do any Ultrabook vs MacBook Air technical comparisons here (feel free in the comments section below) but I have taken the chance to drill down into some sales numbers that show some more dominance by the MBA in this thin-and-light market.
I’ve pulled out two sets of figures from reports and estimates and although there is room for a lot of error here, there are indicators that the MBA is selling at a rate of 300000 units per month.
With late launches, a difficult economy and a lack of consumer awareness it would be no surprise if someone reported low shipping numbers. That report comes via Digitimes today.
Acer and Asus are reported to have shipped around 100k units each which, according to Digitimes data, is about 50% of expected shipment figures.
It’s somewhat difficult to get a handle on the number as availability is still tight across many regions. In Europe, for example, you’ll be lucky to find any Ultrabooks available for delivery. Is the low shipment number due to low customer demand or delays on production lines and marketing teams making final decisions around the world? When I met Toshiba Europe a few weeks ago they still didnt have a final decision on specifications.
It’s too early for a true picture but, I guess, never to early for a comment from Digitimes.
http://liliputing.com/2011/10/ultrabooks-off-to-a-slow-start-due-to-high-prices.html
With an estimated notebook ship volume of 5.4 million units forecast for Q3 2011, top-3 notebook manufacturer Acer is hoping that Ultrabooks will make up 30% of volumes in 2012. That’s something in the region of 6 million unit for the year.
The news comes from Taiwan News who’s article makes an interesting read. Read this section from the ‘half-full’ angle and then again from the ‘half empty’ angle.
"In our survey of 200 local consumers, we found that 77 percent are interested in an ultra-thin notebook PC, with 49 percent of them saying they will switch to the new product within six months,"
Experience tells me that people are happy to say ‘yes I will’ before there’s a chance to buy or a known price. The $1000 price point could change opinion very quickly. Even if Acer leads in price, they will have to cut across huge sections of their own market in just 12 months. Interestingly, Acer also state that they won’t be doing an 11” model because it competes with low-cost devices. They’re probably referring to netbooks with Acer possibly believing that millions of 10 and 11” netbook owners could be tempted to upgrade. Bigger is better, right?
In the current market climate where low-cost tablets are potentially attracting users away from notebook and desktop upgrades and major manufacturers are offering basic ‘almost ultrabooks’ for a much lower price, the 30% figure is going to be a huge challenge.
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