Tablets are Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)’s second largest revenue generator, which has shown a slump in the last two quarters. Year-over-Year iPad sales were down by 3.1 million and 1.3 million units in the last two quarters respectively. IDC data suggest that the overall global tablet sales were down by 9.7% in Q2. Do these stats suggest that people are not interested anymore in buying tablets? Meanwhile, Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) has planned an event on Thursday and speculations are that the new iPad air and iPad Mini might be launched during the event. What is in the store with new tablets to reverse the slide in sales? A ‘cnet’ article discusses about the expectations from Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)’s event on Thursday.
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) might launch a new iPad Air Tablet with traditional 9.7” display, but the new device is expected to be thinner, lighter and faster. It might also have gold model with anti-reflective screens. The new device might have sensor to work with Apple Pay as well. But these changes are minor from the originally successful iPad Air and will it be enough to reverse the slide in tablet sales for Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)? Apple’s migration towards phablet sector with iPhone 6 and 6 plus also might eliminate the need for tablets.
“The industry kind of set its expectations wrong about iPads,[…] Everyone assumed the tablet was kind of like the phone, so the upgrade cycle would be like the phone. That’s not true,” Gartner Analyst Van Baker was quoted as saying.
Kantar Worldpanel data suggests that People are holding on to their iPad’s much longer that they hold on to their iPhones. The data reveals that close to 14% of iPads currently used in US are the original model launched in 2010, 32% are iPad 2 and only 9% of iPads are the 2013 model.
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)’s fiscal third quarter results shows that tablet sales has contributed to 16% of total, which was around 18% a year ago. And against all expectations, Apple Mac sales has gone up and contributed around 15% of total revenue in the fiscal third quarter.
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) is currently banking on its deal with International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE:IBM) to push the tablet sales up. Apple is expected to launch a 12.9” iPad in 2015, which might turn out to be a game changes for the company, but that might not give the company any profits in the upcoming holiday season. Apple hope for some sales in the holiday season with the new iPads but will that turn the tide still remains a bigger question.
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