It’s not only consumers that are in love with Apple, it’s also Wall Street. Apple may sell 28 million iPads in 2011, according to a report from Maynard Um of UBS Investment Research.
If it does, Apple would devastate the Wintel coalition, especially makers of netbooks and notebooks like HP, Dell and Acer. Also hurt would be the tablets coming over the next year from the likes of HP, Samsung, Dell, Acer, Asus and all the ones that are to be based on the Windows 7 OS.
UBS’ Um wrote, “Sales of traditional notebooks appear to be feeling pressure from the iPad, causing a scramble by vendors to launch iPad-like tablets. We believe that a majority of this impact is occurring on the lower end of PC sales as the iPad is priced close enough to this range that it becomes attractive to consumers looking to make purchases within this segment.”
Um predicts Apple will sell 52 million iPhones in calendar year 2011.
Separately Goldman Sachs predicted Apple will sell six million iPads this year.
The facts as to why seem to be:
The iPad works! It’s got proven touchscreen technology, user interface and a well-oiled marketing and support team. Here’s a test: hand an iPad to any kid that’s used a PC and they instantly become an iPad fan.
Also there is no alternate OS that has the maturity and versatility of iOS. Windows 7 and Android don’t seem to match up well with iOS 4. HP’s WebOS is a possibility. The Intel/Meego OS doesn’t have the seasoning and any tablet that comes with Intel’s Atom processor isn’t likely to do well because of Atom’s size, price and heavy power usage. And don’t forget Apple has a major jump on any potential rival with tens of thousands of apps.
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Fianlly App Store and recently hardened iOS4 are bringing in business users, adding to iPads large sales volumes. For most consumers and many business users, there are few applications that they need that can only be done on slower, more power-hungry netbooks and notebooks.
Um also said the iPad is not significantly impacting sales of netbooks. He wrote, “We are not sold that the iPad is purely cannibalizing PC sales, as the functionality of the iPad cannot yet deliver the functionality of notebook PCs. However, consumers who purchase iPads may be more willing to delay purchases and upgrades of existing PCs.”