14 DAY TRIAL // For a number of reasons, Acer hasn't been doing all that well this year, or last year, or even the year before that. That means it has to do something drastic, or at least unusual, to put itself back together.
Acer has reached the conclusion that it won't find its answers at home (Taiwan), which is why it has initiated plans to create a laptop assembly line in Brazil.
At one point in the recent past, China was the largest and most profitable emerging market for PCs, as well as other electronics devices.
Lenovo flourished there most though, using its success to jump in the lead of the worldwide PC market.
Now, other countries are being scouted, and Brazil is one of them. Lenovo hasn't done much there, but Acer did manage to score second place in terms of shipments.
The leader, during the third quarter of 2012 at any rate, was Samsung, with 440,000 units, but Acer made a good showing with 317,000 shipments.
Brazil's own Positivo earned third spot, with 276,000 shipments, while HP and Dell went next, with 186,000 and 147,000 units, respectively. ASUS only managed 88,000.
Unlike the other companies on the list, Acer actually needs to secure a strong foothold in Brazil. Without a new source of revenue, finances will keep going down.
Thus, it has teamed up with Wistron, a Taiwan-based notebook manufacturer for brand vendors, and will prepare an assembly factory. The plant should be ready to start volume production by May 2013 and will focus on 14-inch notebooks, at first anyway.
Since Samsung already has an in-house assembly line in Brazil, Acer is, yet again, stuck trying to catch up to its competitors, rather than one-upping them.
Then again, Acer does hope to surpass Samsung once its plans are carried out, so it might not be too late for the tables to turn.