Though we’ve only recently introduced the third iPad – currently going by the unlikely name of the new iPad – just a couple days ago, it’s not hard to look back on the last couple years since its inception and see a staggering rise in interest in tablets. Not just the iPad, which is by itself a pretty pronounced market, but on all tablets in general. Considering a recent report from iSuppli, however, drives home the point of just how big a rise in interest we’re talking about.
In 2010, back when the iPad was getting started in earnest and a variety of other companies were readying their “me, too!” products, media tablets in general represented the 35th largest market for semiconductors out there. But by 2014, according to the reports, that number will rise until tablets are the fourth largest market for semiconductors out there. In terms of numbers, the 2010 market for semiconductors represented $2.6 billion in sales, but by 2014, that number is expected to top out at fully $18.2 billion, or approximately seven times what it was just four years prior.
Any time you start talking about 600 percent increases in any market, especially a market that’s only a few years old, you’re talking about a paradigm shift so pronounced that you’re left wondering if it still has a transmission. It’s a dizzying increase, and on a market that’s really only getting started in terms of its life cycle. But at the same time, it makes perfect sense. Stop and consider the sheer number of media tablets out there.
I’m not just talking about the big names here, like the iPads and the Galaxy Tabs and the Transformer Primes and the like. I’m talking about all the lesser-known names out there, all the Chinese tablets that may not even have any name more than their catalog number. There are hundreds of tablets out there, and they all need semiconductors.
Of course, it’s not so far-fetched to suggest that there will be some shaking-out of the lesser names, but still, for every no-name looking for shelf space, another bundle of iPad Whatevers just went out the door. Thus, the need for semiconductors in the tablet space will likely be a robust market for some time to come.