Tablet shipment sees growth in Q3 2014

The tablet market continues to grow, albeit not as
quickly as before. Q4 2013 saw 53.8 million units ship
worldwide, up 11.5 percent from 47.6 million the same
quarter last year.
The top three tablet-makers maintained their positions:
Apple was first, Samsung took second, and Asus settled
for third. Nevertheless, all three market leaders lost
share of the overall pie, compared to Q3 2013:
Apple dropped to 22.8 percent market share, meaning it
grabbed less than a quarter of all sales as it shipped
fewer units. Samsung slipped to 18.3 percent, though it
actually shipped more units, and despite its percentage
loss year-over-year, it continued to close in on its
biggest rival.
Asus lost share but managed to maintain the third-place
position it had in Q3 2013, largely thanks to its
Windows-based 2-in-1 devices. Lenovo saw more than
30 percent growth, largely thanks to strength in
emerging markets, while RCA surprised the market and
managed to enter the top five, mainly due to distribution
deals with some of the largest retailers just in time for
the back-to-school season.
The big question for these top five companies will be
related to how they handle the high demand of Black
Friday and the upcoming holiday season. Last year, the
top five were as follows: Apple, Samsung, Amazon,
Asus, and Lenovo.
In Q4 2014, Amazon will likely show up once again, as
the company’s figures are always very seasonal. Apple
and Samsung will fight for first place, while Asus and
Lenovo battle for fourth. Competitors like RCA will find it
difficult to muscle in.
Yet it won’t be completely out of the question. This past
quarter’s results showed us that more and more tablets
are still selling, and the small players are successfully
stealing share from their larger counterparts, mostly by
offering cheaper alternatives.
Yet this can’t last forever, as IDC Senior Research
Analyst Jitesh Ubrani notes in his statement. “Although
the low-cost vendors are moving a lot of volume, the
top vendors, like Apple, continue to rake in the dollars.
A sub-$100 tablet simply isn’t sustainable—Apple knows
this—and it’s likely the reason they aren’t concerned
with market share erosion.”
As tablet shipment growth slows, small players will
eventually be pushed out. In the meantime, however, the
big players are losing sales to cheaper devices.