Lenovo chief says netbook's day is done
Tablet to take 15 per cent of world PC biz
Lenovo has called time on the netbook, stating that the mini-laptop's life is now "pretty much over".
So said the firm's President and COO, Rory Read, in an interview with Dow Jones after confirming Lenovo will release 10in Android tablets worldwide within the next few months.
There'll be an IdeaPad-branded consumer model and a ThinkPad version for business buyers, Read said. Both will be based on ARM chippery, and run Honeycomb.
"Some of the early-generation Android devices were a little ahead of their time," he said, "and what we're doing here is making sure [our tablets] are strong.
"We only have one opportunity to make that first good impression."
A Windows model will appear later in the year, and 7in Android units too.
Read said he expects tablets to corner 15 per cent of the computer market during the next three years, superseding netbooks in the process. ®
COMMENTS
Idiot
People will say anything to desperately try to still fondleslabs. No it doesn't have a keyboard and I can do nothing useful with it, so no it has no place for me or anyone I know. A netbook on the other hand does.
Ahh, but then I wouldn't have bought a Lenovo anyway
Different strokes for different folks
Never mind, Lenovo, I'll keep using my little N130 and you can play with your Android tablet to play Angry Birds. Just don't ask me to use a tablet to type an essay/blog/email on
decay curve
The main thing killing netbooks is that notebooks now cost the same price....
Linux
You mean rather like the pronouncements that no-one wanted Linux netbooks, on the basis that none were selling, mainly because the manufacturers had already licked Redmond's backside and withdrawn anything without Windows from the shelves? Self-fulfilling prophecy, in other words.
Tablets seem fun for playing HarbourMaster and other pointy-clicky things, but simply do not compete with a real laptop - as netbooks are, despite the manufacturers frantically trying to persuade us otherwise a couple of years ago, when they realised the penny had dropped, and the bottom was for a short time blown out of the full-size laptop market. The eventual response of course was as above, re the "simple cheap computers - not enough profit in them".
Nail on the head
I've owned an Eee 701SD for nearly two years (picked it up for barely over £100), and I'd still rather have it over almost any tablet I've ever tried. I don't have a problem with tablets per se, but I run an Ubuntu derivative on my 701, and I do like having access to the apps I'm used to from desktop Ubuntu, at least some of which may not have Android equivalents yet.
Not that I'd turn down a Galaxy Tab or Xoom if someone just donated one to me out of the blue, but I think my Eee will have to turn up its proverbial toes before I even think about replacing it (with a tablet, netbook, smartphone or whatever). Each to their own, though.
