Worldwide media tablet sales are forecast to reach 19.5 million units in 2010 and surpass 208 million units by 2014, says Gartner.
Media tablets are poised for strong growth with worldwide end-user sales projected to total 54.8 million units in 2011 and their impact on other devices will vary among segments, says Carolina Milanesi, research vice president at Gartner.
“The all in one nature of media tablets will result in the cannibalisation of other consumer electronics devices such as e-readers, gaming and media players. Mini notebooks
Gartner also predicts mini notebooks will suffer the strongest, cannibalisation threat as media tablets average selling price drop below $300 over the next two years.
“Low-end consumer notebooks will only marginally suffer from cannibalisation. The majority of the impact will be from 7-inch media tablets on high- end smartphones as it will be hard for a user to justify owning both when the differentiation in model is very limited”, adds Milanesi.
In 2010, points Gartner, WiFi media tablets will account for 55% of sales and by 2014 they will account for 80%. However, as these devices become available in more markets, North America which accounts 61% of media tablet sales will see a 43% drop by 2014.
Milanesi says as media tablets move from early adopters to mainstream, they will become a family purchase as well a personal one. The touch interface, the applications available on different operating systems and the simpler set up compared to a fully-fledged computer make media tablets for a range of consumers.
“Communication service providers who have so far subsidised mini-notebooks to drive mobile broadband uptake will shift their marketing spend to media tablets. Such subsidies will help drive adoption among those consumers who see the initial hardware cost as a hurdle,” says Milanesi.
She further asserts that as costs decrease, media tablets will be added to the list of devices lying around the house that are shared by the family
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