There was a 2% fall in tablet shipments in MEA between Q1’14 and Q2’14, according to IDC. As well as the expected fall due to the traditionally slow summer season and Ramadan, shipments were also affected by inventory build-up from Q1. Despite this, the region is still the fastest-growing in the world.
Samsung retained first place with 862,000 shipments, despite representing a double-digit QoQ decline. Apple, with 622,000 shipments, remained in second place and Lenovo came in third with 420,000 units. Asus (284,000 units) returned to fourth place. General Mobile came in fifth with 282,000 units – primarily the result of Turkey’s Fatih Project.
Victoria Mendes, an IDC research analyst, said that traditional PC vendors, such as Lenovo, Asus, Toshiba, HP and Acer, are “becoming much more aggressive” with product launches and pricing. There is a shift towards these Tier 2 brands in MEA. Meanwhile the market leaders, Samsung and Apple, saw their combined share fall 6 percentage points to 37%. The trend is expected to continue.
