TrendForce: Tablet shipments reached 168.5 million units in 2015, down 12.2% year-on-year

The latest tablet computer shipment report from global market research firm TrendForce shows that tablet computer shipments in 2015 reached 168.5 million units, a year-on-year decline of 12.2%, the first double-digit decline and a clear trend of shrinking market size.

Wang Jingyi, a notebook computer analyst at TrendForce, said that the major reasons for the sharp decline in tablet computer shipments in 2015 were the saturation of the market, the long product life cycle, and the increase in alternative products. In 2015, 2-in-1 notebook computers and mobile phones with screens larger than 5 inches were launched in large numbers, which greatly affected the tablet computer demand.

Apple's market share fell below 30% for the first time, Samsung pushed OLED products to stabilize its market share

Although Apple still holds the top spot, its shipments dropped sharply from 63.4 million units in 2014 to 49.56 million units in 2015, a year-on-year decrease of 22%, much higher than the overall market average; its market share also dropped from 33% in 2014 to 29.4% in 2015. Wang Jingyi said that the severe environment and weak demand have affected Apple the most in terms of shipment scale, and other brands continue to share the market, making it difficult to maintain market share.

Although Apple launched a new product iPad Pro in the fourth quarter of 2015, its price and specifications are positioned at the high end, which has limited impact on shipments. Currently, Apple has no signs of launching a new generation of iPad mini. In 2015, the shipment of the entire iPad mini product line was about 20 million units, accounting for about 41% of Apple's tablet computer shipments. TrendForce estimates that if no new iPad mini products are launched in 2016 and only the old models continue to be sold, Apple's total tablet computer shipments in 2016 will be less than 40 million units.

Samsung retained the second place, with annual shipments of 33.5 million units, a year-on-year decline of 18%. In 2015, Samsung made major adjustments to its product line. In addition to strategically changing the size and specifications, it also took advantage of Samsung's small-size OLED technology to launch a number of OLED products. As a result, its market share only decreased by 1.5 percentage points, remaining stable at 19.9%.

Lenovo's largest tablet market is in Europe. Although the European exchange rate is unstable and the sharp depreciation has caused the overall demand in Europe to decline, Lenovo still maintains its third place with its rich product line and deep layout of European channels, and its market share has slightly increased to 5.8%.

Amazon launched its new 7-inch Fire tablet in the fourth quarter of 2015. With its ultra-low price of US$49.99 and a buy-five-get-one-free offer, the product became an instant hit as soon as it was launched, contributing more than 3.5 million units to the fourth quarter, pushing Amazon to the fourth place, narrowly beating ASUS.

Asus' strategy for 2015 was to maintain profit margins instead of aggressively grabbing market share. As a result, its annual shipments declined by 34%, and its shipment ranking also dropped from fourth in 2014 to fifth.

Although Microsoft still failed to rank among the top five in 2015, in addition to the hot sales of its old models, the launch of the new generation 12.3-inch Surface Pro 4 continued to achieve good results, driving Microsoft's annual shipments to grow by nearly 50% against the trend, and successfully leading the trend of 2-in-1 models.