Global laptop shipments rose 1.9 percent year-on-year last quarter to 37.6 million units, following a 5 percent decline in the second quarter, US market researcher International Data Corp (IDC) said in a report on Thursday.
The tablet market returned to growth last quarter, backed by new product launches, the report said.
Apple Inc continued to dominate the global scene, boosting its market share to 31.4 percent by shipping 11.8 million units, IDC said, attributing the increase to the launch of a new iPad model late last quarter.
Apple is the largest player in the detachable space, and its latest device came with a “Smart Connector,” which offers a removable keyboard option, IDC said.
Given that all iPads — except for the Mini — are equipped with this device as well as the company’s unique operating system, the report singled out Apple as a threat to the traditional PC market.
Amazon.com Inc edged out Samsung Electronics Co in second place, with a market share of 14.5 percent last quarter, the report said.
Its shipments rose 25.6 percent annually to 5.5 million units, buoyed by the introduction of the new Fire 7 and the e-commerce retailer’s annual Prime Day Sale.
Samsung dropped to third place as it shipped 4.6 million units last quarter, down 13.9 percent on an annual basis, with a market share of 14.5 percent.
Nonetheless, the South Korean company’s Tab A series continued to enjoy strong popularity, accounting for more than half of the company’s shipments last quarter, the report said.
Huawei Technologies Co (華為), which claimed about 9.5 percent of the market, also posted a 4.4 percent annual decline in shipments to 3.6 million units last quarter, as it faced steady pressure from the US, it said.
Another major China-based company Lenovo Group Ltd (聯想) saw a 7.6 percent year-on-year increase in shipments to 2.5 million units.
The company accounted for 6.7 percent of the market, up from 6.3 percent a year ago, bolstered by robust sales in regions including Asia-Pacific, Europe, the Middle East and Africa, the report said.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day