China white-box players leaving tablet market and pushing into new applications
Monica Chen, Taipei; Joseph Tsai, DIGITIMES [Monday 9 May 2016]
With the global tablet market becoming mature and related shipments gradually weakening, China's
white-box players are leaving the market and turning to focus on new businesses such as 2-in-1 devices,
robots and virtual reality.
Worldwide tablet shipments reached the peak in 2013 at more than 200 million units, of which Apple's
iPad series contributed 74.2 million units; however, the volume has been dropping each year and iPad
only shipped 49.6 million units in 2015.
In the second half of 2015, the number of white-box tablet players in China had fallen to one-third of
segment's peak. Although Intel has been providing assistance to white-box players over funding, technology,
marketing and orders to help them develop Intel-based tablets, most white-box players have not been
aggressive about selling these products.
For ARM-based tablets, vendors are selling off inventories and no longer developing new models.
However, with white-box players turning to emerging applications, some market watchers are concerned that
these new markets will see a new wave of price competition.
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