Apple’s IPad Is Outselling Every Laptop On The Market

Over the course of a few years, Apple's market share suffered slowly after its peak in 1990 and by 1996, experts believed the company to be doomed. It was not until 1997, when Apple was desperately in need of an operating system, that it bought out NeXT Software (Jobs' company) and the board of directors decided to ask for some help from an old friend: Steve Jobs. Jobs became an interim CEO, or iCEO as he called himself (Jobs was not officially the CEO until 2000). Jobs decided to make some changes around Apple. He forged an alliance with Microsoft to create a Mac version of its popular office software. Not long after this decision was the turning point for the company. Jobs revamped the computers and introduced the iBook (a personal laptop) followed by iPod, an mp3 player, which became market leader.

Apple’s iPad is outselling every laptop on the market

Apple captured a 26.8 percent share of the tablet market in 2017, meaning that roughly one in every four tablets sold last year was an iPad. Apple's tablet market share rose 2.5 percentage points year-on-year.

Apple wants to push iPad sales now like never before in order to widen the sales gap between iPad and Mac. Large screen iPads have experienced some momentum in recent months. Management is building off that strength to unveil a broader campaign to boost iPad sales. If Apple is successful in increasing large screen iPad sales to a 40M unit sales annual pace (a 30% increase from current levels), iPad would be outselling Mac by 2x. This would certainly help change the iPad versus Mac narrative in the marketplace, giving Apple that much more motivation to dedicate attention and resources to other products.

Along with Samsung and Lenovo, Apple is at the forefront of the so-called post-PC era. Instead of relying on a desktop or laptop for everything, smartphones, laptops, and PCs are playing complementary roles in our everyday lives. Each device now suits specific situations from crunching massive spreadsheets at the office to catching up on reading into the wee hours before dozing off.

In India, the iPads; now available in 11-inch and 12.9-inch sizes are priced starting from Rs 71,900 and going as high as Rs 1,03,900 for the top variant of the device. Tim Cook, CEO, Apple proudly claimed at the launch event on 30 October that iPads outsell all laptops in the market, with over 400 million units sold till date.

In a few years, Chromebooks began to take over the market by 2014 - the primary reason for their popularity being the price. Chromebooks had most of the features of a laptop but without the expensive memory of laptops. A Chromebook costed roughly $199 whereas a basic iPad price ranged from $300-$400. This became a favorable point for parents who wanted their kids to own a device exclusively for school work.

At a time when Dell, HP, and Acer are struggling in the PC market, Asus would have probably been better off putting its emphasis on its cutting edge laptop and desktop designs and taking market share from its struggling rivals. Still, the Transformer line could help Asus become a leader in Intel's hybrid Ultrabook movement -- although that concept is certainly not guaranteed to be a slam dunk with consumers.

Windows has the most to lose from the iPad since the iPad is eating the bottom out of the PC market. Every person who chooses an iPad instead of a laptop is taking about $50 out of Microsoft's pocket and putting about $300 into Apple's pocket. That helps explain why in the two years since the iPad was introduced, Apple has soared past Microsoft in revenue, profit, and market value -- even though the iPad will sell about 60 million units in 2012 while PCs will sell about 400 million units.

While the company's computers and laptops are still far from outselling its tablets, Apple said it had sold a record 5.7 million Macs in a single quarter while iPad sales slumped to their lowest point since June 2011.

In terms of hardware sales, no news is generally bad news. If a company's latest phone, laptop, TV, console, handheld or tablet is flying off the shelves it won't be able to get exact figures out soon enough; if the device is a struggling, you're more likely to hear about percentage increases and stolen market share. 350c69d7ab