14 DAY TRIAL // Samsung hasn't been shy about making statements on its intention of conquering the tablet market in 2014. Ever since last year, the Korean tech giant has been claiming that it plans to challenge the dominion of the almighty iPad.
But if April brought us encouraging numbers showing that Samsung is slowly but surely gaining marketshare, a few months later the trend has been turned around.
Research firm IDC has recently shared the numbers related to tablet marketshare in Q2 2013 and we’re seeing both Apple and Samsung are experiencing decreasing shipments.
The Cupertino tech sensation dropped from 33% marketshare in Q2 of last year to 26.9% during the same period in 2014.
Likewise, Samsung is going down the same retched road with its numbers sinking from 18.8% to 17.2%. So even as the Korean tech giant struggles to become everybody’s favorite tablet-wise, they still have a long way to go, especially with this developing trend ahead of them.
You might be wondering where all the lost marketshare went. Well, to other tablet players such as Lenovo, ASUS or Acer, which are listed by the name in IDC’s rankings. There’s also the Others category, practically including smaller, not so well-known brands, which interestingly enough snatches the largest proportion of tablet marketshare with 44.4%.
All things considered, we should point out that the largest year-over-year growth can be attributed to Lenovo which managed to boost up sales with an impressive 64.7% compared to the same time last year.
IDC draws attention on the rise of large screen smartphones, which are affecting the development of things in the tablet market.
“As we indicated last quarter, the market is still being impacted by the rise of large-screen smartphones and longer than anticipated ownership cycles. We can also attribute the market deceleration to slow commercial adoption of tablets.”
“Despite the trend, we believe that stronger commercial demand for tablets in the second half of 2014 will help market grow and that we will see more enterprise-specific offerings, as illustrated by the Apple and IBM partnership, come to market.”
Judging by the fact that Samsung has recently put out two new flagship tablets, coming in the form of the Galaxy Tab S AMOLED family, there is hope that the Korean tech giant might jump back in the saddle while tablet sales are concerned.
Samsung has tablet products to cater to the needs of each consumer category, including professional, media or budget offerings, but despite this fact, it appears the company is having a hard time convincing consumer Samsung is the way to go, tablet-wise.