As per a report by IDC, shipments of Chromebooks and tablets continued to grow in Q2 2021. Although the demand for these two product categories continues to exist, their growth might get impacted in the next quarter.
IDC says that the shipments of Chromebooks grew 68.6% YoY in the second quarter of 2021. On the other hand, tablet shipments increased only 4.2% YoY. Their numbers stood at 12.3 million units and 40.5 million units respectively.
Although the last quarter did not set any record like the previous quarters, the numbers are strong enough. So why could the shipments get affected? The answer is “shortage of components”.
According to IDC, Chromebooks are still in high demand. In fact, many education deals are still in the backlog. But despite that, OEMs have started prioritizing higher-margin Windows laptops due to the ongoing global component shortage.
Further, the report also states that the consumer demand for tablets might slow much faster than the Chromebooks. This should be a bigger concern for OEMs like Xiaomi, realme, OPPO, OnePlus, and vivo that are expected to release tablets in the second half of 2021.
Anyway, as per IDC senior research analyst Anuroopa Nataraj, there are still ample opportunities for tablets and Chromebooks in the education sector. Emerging markets continue to use Android tablets, whereas developed markets like the USA and Canada prefer Chromebooks. Some Asian and European regions have also started leaning towards Chromebooks lately.
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