(Credit:Acer)Microsoft seemingly believestablet sales will outpace sales of desktops next year.
Speaking today at the TechEd Europe conference in Amsterdam, Antoine LeBlond, Microsoft’s vice president of Windows Web Services, said that “next year, tablets will outsell desktop PCs,” according to Computer Pro, which was in attendance at the event.
LeBlond reportedly didn’t provide the margin of victory tablets should score next year, but he did say that “touch” functionality will dramatically change the Computer market “just like the mouse did.”.
Consumers are going mobile, and they’re increasingly buying products that help them do more when they’re on the road.
That’s precisely why laptops outsell desktops, and why there’s a strong possibility that eventually, tablets will outsell desktops.
Windows RT devices are expected to cost less than Windows 8 ones —think Android tablets or the iPad versus Windows laptops — and Windows RT users won’t have to pay for their copies of Office.
The first, which centered on tablets, revealed that the research firm had revised upward its 2013 forecast on tablet shipments from 137.4 million units to 142.8 million units.
Just a few days later, IDC offered up its shipment forecast on desktops, saying they should hit 161.5 million units worldwide next year.
Now, it’s important to point out that LeBlond specifically said “sales” during his presentation, and IDC’s figures are based on shipments.
To further complicate matters, some companies categorize sales as units sold into the retail channel but not actually sold to consumers.
Victor Arrington is a business journalist based in Orange, California. Victor has a passion for financial markets and breaking news stories and loves writing about business news, stock market, and economic opinions that matters most to its audience. Victor spends a lot of time discovering and researching latest financial markets and industry news stories in order to make sure the latest and greatest stories are brought to you first on BigBoardNews.com.
