Tablets and ultrabooks became more affordable in emerging markets last year, says ABI Research. The ASPs of these products fell 7.8% YoY in 2014 as the market matured and commoditised. This represents roughly a 30% fall in the average weeks of household income required to buy a tablet or ultrabook.
Tablet prices fell 8.5% and ultrabook prices 7.1% across 22 countries. The increased reach of these models may help to offset their slowing growth. Prices fell the most in Chile last year: 56% for tablets and ultrabooks combined, or 70.3% for tablets alone; tablet ASPs were driven down by the introduction of new low-cost devices. By contrast, average prices actually rose in India, by 22% for both product categories, or 34.5% for tablets. A ‘surge’ in eCommerce presence, Apple products and mid-tier devices was the cause, according to ABI.
Indonesia saw the largest change in the ‘weeks of income to buy a tablet or ultrabook’ rank. 11 weeks were required to purchase an ultrabook in 2013, and almost four weeks for tablets. In 2014 these figures had fallen to 5.9 weeks and 1.5 weeks, respectively. Rising competition was the main cause of the fall.
